Ann Aptaker’s Flesh And Gold (published by Bold Strokes Books in 2018) is an LGBTQ crime novel set in Havana circa 1952, and featuring Aptaker’s recurring protagonist Castor Gold, a “dapper art thief and smuggler,” as they search the seedy streets and sordid quarters in search of their kidnapped lover Sophie de la Luna y Sol.

I liked aspects of this book — the setting (Cuba), the era — 1950s before the fall of Batista, the emphasis on an LGBTQ protagonist. But there were things I liked less — weak dialogue, a loose plot, a protagonist that felt like a caricature and seemed at times too dim-witted to be an effective series hero.

I wanted this novel to push the hardboiled genre into bold new directions by challenging traditional gender roles, and it did that, somewhat. I just which it could have done that without relying so heavily on the overdone tropes of hardboiled crime fiction. Overall, call it a near miss, but if you are looking for a hardboiled series that features LGBTQ themes and characters, you might want to check it out.

I liked the first few chapters but after i while i lost interest. The main character was interesting but i felt that she was a little flat and weak in comparison to what see should have been.

Fourth in the Cantor Gold series - and I strongly recommend you read the first three. Flesh and Gold is a gritty noire style of novel with the tough as nails, reckless and charming Cantor as the central character. This go around is set in Havana and there's lots of intrigue and a lot of violence while she continues her search for her lost love. If you like old school gangster/noire, this is a great read but definitely not if you are squeamish. Aptaker writes this genre extremely well and its definitely a change of pace from most of the lesfic novels you'll come across

Havana, 1952, a city throbbing with pleasure and danger, where the Mob peddles glamor to the tourists and there's plenty of sex for sale. In the swanky hotels and casinos, and the steamy, secretive Red Light district of the Colón, Cantor Gold, dapper art thief and smuggler, searches the streets and brothels for her kidnapped love, Sophie de la Luna y Sol. Cantor races against time while trying to out run the deadly schemes of American mobsters and the gunsights of murderous local gangs.

Oh man alive! This has to be the most hair raising (and heartbreaking) adventure for Cantor Gold yet.

In her relentless pursuit to find Sophie, Cantor finally gets a lead to where her lost love might have been taken after she was kidnapped from the streets. Havanna is the backdrop for this 4th book in the series and it’s the darkest one yet. Like always, Gold finds herself in hot water when just about every party on the island wants to silence this meddling Americano for good. If only our dapper dyke art smuggler would know who to trust.

”The melody and rhythm of a lovely Cuban danzón flows softly from inside the house when Agnes opens the door. She’s all decked out in a gold lamé gown that reminds me of a getup I saw in an Ava Gardner picture, except Ava Gardner is svelte and beautiful and Agnes is puffy. But there’s beauty in Agnes tonight. Maybe it’s the classy Cuban music behind her with its strains of elegant romance, or maybe it’s her no-nonsense gutter wisdom at ease with her hard-won luxuries, like the expensive lamé gown and the gold and ruby rings on her fingers. Here at the door of her stylish temple of pleasure for profit, built by perseverance and brains in a hard game, the up-from-the-Havana-gutter New England spinster Agnes Cain is beautiful.

This part made me love Ann Aptaker even more because in this beautiful little segment she references to my favorite Hollywood actress (and most beautiful woman of the silver screen) Ava Gardner in her gold lamé dress. The dress she wore at the premiere of The Barefoot Comtessa in 1954. Just do yourself a favor and Google ‘Ava Gardner premiere Barefoot Comtessa’ and try not to drool all over your keyboard.

Aptaker makes my heart sing. This Crime Noir series is just pure perfection. It violent and dark but there is such poetry in the way she paints a scene. Her women are both vulnerable and calculating, sultry, sexy and always magnets for trouble. I always hope against hope that none of them will have died by the end of the book, but alas… Ann Aptaker is just as bad as George R. R. Martin in that regard. She does not discriminate and therefore her women die just as easily as the goons.

Don’t look for romance. Cantor Gold beds other women but has only one love, Sophie de la Luna y Sol, and she will go to hell and back to find her.

f/f graphic violence and death

Themes: 1950ies Havanna, thugs-a-plenty, who can you trust, gang wars, Chivas neat, will we finally meet Sophie?

5 stars

* A free copy was provided by Netgalley and Bold Strokes Books Inc. for an honest review.

I don't want to sound harsh but this is not my cub of tea, the ending is just "ugh" i walked fast around the pages since the story was kinda depressing for me yet i wanted to finish the book or give it a chance but man .... so so not my book.

i was giving free copy in exchange of an honest review

Dapper, dashing, and determined Cantor Gold is at it again. This period piece is so entertaining and unsettling as she steps into the world we know exist but don't care to know more about. As she continues her search for Sophia she finds out who her "friends" are. I like how Cantor is described and I appreciate her self-talk and willingness to show vulnerability.

I had not heard of this author or series before receiving this book from the publisher in exchange for an honest review.

Are you a fan of the movies made famous by Kate Hepburn, Bette Davis?

This book captures the flavor and color of New York 's and Cuba's mob protected businesses with well written characters and descriptive scene setting.

Cantor Gold is a perfect cross dressing New Yorker - her suits are crisp, her hats an extension of her feisty, unapologetic Lesbian self. She has street smarts and a big heart that has been broken by the kidnapping of her lover, Sophie..

I reccomend this book as a fun, fast.
Absorbing read. I'm going to now read the other books in the series, in order.