cover image Long Time Gone: A Black Panther's True-Life Story: Of His Skyjacking and Twenty-Five Years in Cuba

Long Time Gone: A Black Panther's True-Life Story: Of His Skyjacking and Twenty-Five Years in Cuba

William Lee Brent. Crown Publishers, $25 (0pp) ISBN 978-0-8129-2486-2

Black Panther memoirs may now be in fashion, but Brent's story, though surely readable, is a minor one. Shaped by racism in the South and the army, he was drawn to the outlaw life of the streets and at 22 was sent to San Quentin for armed robbery. Out of prison, he gained inspiration from the Panthers' uncompromising stance, joined the group and gained greater stature in it. Dazed by drugs, he shot and wounded two San Francisco cops pursuing him; the Panthers expelled him for violating Panther discipline. Rather than face trial, Brent daringly hijacked a plane to Cuba. Half this book concerns his life in Cuba, but his tales of international Panther politics (including reinstatement by Huey Newton), cutting sugarcane proudly and bed-hopping with leftist internationalists are not too deep. Brent eventually joined Radio Havana Cuba, though he acknowledges that his reporting couldn't be fully honest. He remains a supporter of black liberation and the Cuban revolution, but offers no larger analysis. Photos not seen by PW. (Feb.)