Mexican Gothic Review

Mexican Gothic by Silvia Moreno-Garcia
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

I had a harder time with this one. That's not to say the writing is complex or difficult. Its actually easy to follow and well written. My problem is the overall pacing and scene structure. There are few scenes in this book that have anything other than dialogue. Without much movement everything feels like a play. with very little pulling the scenes together to flow naturally. On minute characters are talking in one room and the next minute they're in another having the same or a similar conversation.

The characters and dialogue itself is very good with clear motivations and differing tones. This is done by having a small cast where everyone's role and relationships are well defined. The narration of the audiobook however leaves a little to be desired. for a natural scene, Frankie Corzo does fine, sometimes overpronouncing words. However that tone doesn't change as the mood of a scene changes. I wouldn't call it monotone, because there is plenty of range in her standard creepy neutral emotion. But when a scene gets scarier or suspenseful the mood of her voice does not match.

There is a lot of Lovecraft inspiration here and it was easy to see parallels with other Lovecraft inspired stories I've read. The Mask of Silver comes to mind. Like many of those other books, its hard to stick the landing, and I think Mexican Gothic stumbles a little near the end.

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