Stephen Kimber

“In this remarkable piece of investigative journalism, Kimber has unearthed a riveting story at the very heart of why there is little hope of political reconciliation between Cuba and the United States — until there is justice for the Cuban Five.”

Judges’ Citation | Evelyn Richardson Prize for Nonfiction | 2014 East Coast Literary Awards

“What Lies Across the Water: The Real Story of the Cuban Five is an historical narrative, an expose, a political thriller, a romance, entwined in a maze of endless twists and turns involving terrorists and foreign agents… By weaving the story of the Cuban Five into the history of U.S.-Cuban relations, Kimber highlights the grotesque patterns of both the history and the story.”

Jane Franklin| Author of Cuban Foreign Relations: A Chronology, 1959-1982, and Cuba and the United States: A Chronological History

“With surgeon-like skill, Kimber dissects, bottom up, an injustice perpetrated at the highest levels on Cuban patriots acting for their government with few financial resources in a hostile foreign country… An important and riveting book.”

Chris Benjamin| Atlantic Books Today

 “What Lies Across the Water connects the dots between the Cuban American National Foundation — an influential lobby group of Cuban exiles living in the U.S., the Brothers to the Rescue organization and paramilitary operations meant to violently overthrow the Cuban government and assassinate Fidel Castro… Those looking for truthful testimony about the Cuban Five will find that What Lies Across the Water makes a compelling and damning case.”

Yutaka Dirks | Rabble.ca

“With this important new book Kimber does a masterful job of showcasing his abundant talents as an investigative journalist and popular writer… What is remarkable is how he picked up this story, and began to collect all available information about it and to study it prodigiously. What is surprising is that he ended up putting so much meticulous work into uncovering the details of this exceptional story. What Lies Across the Water is easy to read, written almost like a novel. It is packed with information and entertains as well as informs.”

Charles Spurr | Media Co-op

 “Far from being a boring account of deeds and misdeeds, Kimber employs eloquent prose and an enjoyable style to draw the reader into the tangled layers of terrorism and murder, espionage and deception, propaganda and myths, life sentences and impunity, meanness and hatred, love and sacrifice, romance and solitude, patriotism and delusion, good intentions and bad, and lies, lies, and more lies.”

Dawn Gable |Havana Times

 “[The book] is fruit of a research carried out by someone who at the start was not a defender or sympathizer with the cause of The Five. Kimber, as many of the thousand Canadians who visit Cuba, probably bumped more than once into a propaganda poster written with naiveté or linguistic clumsiness; or heard someone speak with admiration of The Five Heroes. But he knew almost nothing when he started his research… It is not a lengthy work, difficult to read; quite the opposite. Its light and clear language allows readers to move along the episodes of the conflict, and finish in a few hours a story that captured them from the first page. It is the work of a master journalist, a great writer, and above all an honest intellectual committed only to what he could verify on his own.

Ricardo Alarcón | Cubadebate

“Kimber’s account of the Cuban Five comes with a bit of bias. However, it’s ultimately a compelling read, but only after you doggedly surmount its difficult structure.”

Douglas J. Johnston | Winnipeg Free Press

“Publication of What Lies Across the Water, Stephen Kimber’s book about Cuban anti-terrorists serving wildly extravagant terms in U.S. jails, is a remarkable event… The author’s clear, flowing, and often seat-gripping, even entertaining, narrative is an added plus. The book is highly recommended.”

W.T. Whitney | Counterpunch

“Stephen Kimber’s book is an invaluable and informative account of the last chapter of the Cold War between Cuba and the United States— a story that is alternatively bizarre, surreal and ever suspenseful.”

Ann Louise Bardach | Author, Without Fidel and Cuba Confidential

“This book removes the thin fabric of lies around the case of five Cuban intelligence agents who came to Miami to fight terrorism… This book has the detail and the analysis. Read it.”

Saul Landau | Director, Will The Real Terrorist Please Stand Up?

 “… provides the key information and analysis needed to understand the case of the Cuban Five.”

Danny Glover | Actor

 “… the most complete – and moving – account of the Cuban Five I’ve yet read.”

Wayne Smith | Former Director, US Interests Section in Havana, 1979-82

“… a thorough and detailed telling of the case of the Five…. feels like a ticking time bomb before the arrests.”

José Pertierra | Attorney, Washington

 “If you want to know how [the case of the Cuban Five] fits into the history of relations between Cuba and the United States, you must read this book… [Kimber’s] combination of narrative style and historical knowledge makes the book a tool for educating the general public about the peculiarities of the case of the Five.”

Arturo Lopez-Levy | Josef Korbel School of International Studies, University of Denver |
Co-author Raul Castro and the New Cuba: A Close Up View of Change

“the most definitive work to date on the case of the Cuban Five.”

Arthur Heitzer | Lawyer, Chicago

“Meticulously researched, factual without being dull, and written with sensitivity and honesty — warts and all…”

 “This book is the fruit of painstaking, indefatigable research. Professor Kimber had to connect many dots to go to the heart of our case, and he did it brilliantly. I hope one day he will be able to update the story with the happy ending that many justice-seeking people around the world are still working on.”

Gerardo Hernández Nordelo | Member of the Cuban Five