WILD Green Oranges (Clapton Press) describes how author Bob Baldock dropped out of college and was at loose ends in 1958. Then he became inspired after a chance viewing of a newsreel. It was about a band of rebels in the remote eastern mountains of Cuba fighting a guerilla war against the US-backed Batista dictatorship. He had access to news about the little-known events in Cuba at his job as a copyboy at the (now defunct) New York Herald Tribune and became determined to interview the rebels.

Then a youth of 19 years, his only travel outside the Midwest was to New York City. He recruited another dropout classmate, forged press credentials, and hitched to Miami. Working odd jobs and getting by with a little help from their friends to buy air tickets, the two flew to Havana.

Dodging Batista’s security, the buddies traveled across the island toward the rebel enclave. His descriptions of the deprivation in Cuba under the dictatorship are graphic.