In The Intruders, Carlos Manuel Alvarez dives into the recent protest organized in Havana by the San Isidro Movement, which brought together more than two hundred Cuban artists, intellectuals, and activists. In November 2020, the island's regime imprisoned rapper Denis Solís, which led to a peaceful encampment, an unprecedented civic response that seems to have irreversibly changed the sentimental political map of the country. A mixture of reportage, testimony, profile and memory, the book portrays the lives of the participants in this event and also the author's intimate experience with the Cuban Stasi as part of the social turmoil shared by that dissident group. At the same time, it explores some very pertinent categories on the island: revolution, dictatorship, language and totalitarianism. Castroism is understood here not only as an expression of authoritarian power, but also as a habit, a culture, a doctrine that shapes emotionally and intellectually. "I want to believe that the book proposes an aesthetic of militancy at risk," said the author, while reflecting on the role of journalism, writing, and art.
