text: Cuban novelist Jose Soler Puig dies at 79 . HAVANA 1996-08-31 One of Cuba 's most acclaimed authors , Jose Soler Puig , died at the age of 79 , the official newspaper Granma reported on Saturday . Puig 's first novel , " Bertillon 166 , " was published in 1960 , a year after the Cuban revolution brought President Fidel Castro to power . The book , which has been translated into 40 languages , deals with a day in the life of Santiago de Cuba , Puig 's native city , under the pre-Castro government of Fulgencio Batista . The titles of his other novels translate as " In the Year of January " ( 1963 ) , " The Collapse " ( 1964 ) , " Sleeping Bread " ( 1975 ) , " The Decaying Mansion " ( 1977 ) and " A World of Things " ( 1982 ) , followed by " The Knot , " " Soul Alone " and , most recently , " A Woman . " Granma called " Sleeping Bread " Puig 's " greatest gift to the modern novel in our America . " The author said in an interview shortly before his death that his own experiences had lent his books their strong sense of realism . " I 'm a thief of ideas , " he said . " The stories have been given to me by people . " In the same interview , published by Prensa Latina on Saturday , Puig was asked if he feared death . " Death is not a punishment -- death is the end of life 's punishment , " he said .