Mexican Gothic ♦ Silvia Moreno-Garcia | Review

Mexican Gothic had already fascinated me with the mysterious but beautiful cover. The blurb also impressed me. But what happened next, I wasn’t prepared for. Despite how exciting it seems, this story is lacking depth. The charm, or challenge, depending on how you look at it, of this weird yet engaging story is found in the final third of the narrative.



Mexican Gothic ♦ Silvia Moreno-Garcia

Opinion

Noemí Taboada, a young, wealthy, and wild party girl in the 1950s in Mexico, travels to isolated High Place, a very old estate that has been contaminated with the decay of dead and mold all over the place of the mansion. A strange letter from her ailing cousin, Catalina, in which she is pleading for rescue from High Place and an unidentified oppressor, is the reason for Noemí’s trip.

When Noemí arrives at the spooky place with its creepy residents, very quickly she realizes that something is seriously wrong. She experiences dreams, delusions, and voices Francis Doyle, a weak young man intimidated by his powerful elders is the only Doyle family member, Catalina married into, that Noemí can possibly trust. The story is pretty disgusting when I realized what is happening. As much as I enjoyed the haunting story and the exposure of all the physical horrors and sacrifices, I had to get used to this narrative. This book is for people who like light horror and some creepy stuff. I have no regrets reading this book, but it was definitely not what I expected.

Silvia Moreno-Garcia is a truly talented writer. Her emotional style of writing quickly captivates her readers. The final third of the book was wonderful despite being weird, whereas the first two thirds were a touch dull and slow-paced. It got off to a great start. I loved the ominous mood and the spooky relatives. Some of them I wanted to slap into reality. The storytelling got somewhat unreliable, that at some point I couldn’t really follow it no more and I got confused quickly. The part of the family patriarch’s old and mysterious secret took an immense toll on my imagination. Everything turned out to be absurd and strange.

Conclusion

⭐⭐⭐/5

Even though it was a peculiar read I’m pleased I read Mexican Gothic because now I finally understand the commotion about it. Silvia Moreno-Garcia is a talented writer with a distinctive style of expression, which I already experience in her book The Beautiful Ones. I’ll attempt reading the German edition of this book once more, although my first read left a strange feeling, which I couldn’t shake off yet. Sometimes a translation can carry a complete different feeling.


This review was first published at The Art of Reading. ( )

Auch die deutsche Übersetzung konnte mich von dem Buch nicht überzeugen. Klar, es war atmosphärisch, teils auch wirklich gruselig. Aber auch sehr, na ja ... anders. Und am Ende blieb es ein wenig verwirrend. ( )

I rated it a 3.5 because I'm not a fan of horror, but I liked Mexican Gothic a lot more than I've liked books in a similar vein. This is also the second book of Moreno-Garcia's where the ending bumped up the rating from what it would have been. ( )

I want to enjoy this novel but could not finish. Some readers will relish the extended suspense. Others will feel Moreno-Garcia’s reveals infrequent and usually inconsequential, and the conversation repetitive. ( )

2024 book #24. 2020. 22-yo Noemi' lives a happy life in 1950 Mexico City until her father sends her to visit her cousin, now married to the master of a dark and moldy mansion far from the city. An OK start but the reason for the creepiness of the place was a bit far out for me. ( )