Goooooood Saturday to you. You’re getting two for the price of one today.

Continuing my ‘October is Spooky’, beginning with Mexican Gothic–I picked up this book very specifically because I heard so many literary agents talking about it. Not only socially, but in pitching horror stories a lot of feedback I got was ‘Is it like Mexican Gothic?’

People love this book and I am a convert.

Mexican Gothic
Silver Nitrate by Silvia Moreno-Garcia

Goooooood Saturday to you. You’re getting two for the price of one today.

Continuing my ‘October is Spooky’, beginning with Mexican Gothic–I picked up this book very specifically because I heard so many literary agents talking about it. Not only socially, but in pitching horror stories a lot of feedback I got was ‘Is it like Mexican Gothic?’

People love this book and I am a convert.

Moreno does an amazing job of creating a landscape and atmosphere very similar to many early black and white horror films; I’ve heard her tone directly compared to Del Toro and this novel specifically to Crimson Peak, though very clearly Moreno knows her stuff about the old film industry that inspired Del Toro (more on that in a bit).

Mexican Gothic is so reminiscent of Bride of Frankenstein for me, and I’d honestly hate to spoil anything about the turn in plot where it takes on to become a more modern horror, just please read it.

I came off of the high of Mexican Gothic wanting more Silvia Moreno-Garcia. I even did that thing where I reread specific passages because I liked the wording that much.

Seriously. Read Mexican Gothic.

Luckily, it was right around debut time for Silver Nitrate.

My first take away beginning Silver Nitrate is the care and treatment of old horror films; Moreno Gracia clearly knows not only through her own research but anecdotally a great deal about the golden age of horror. I related, for better or worse, to Montserrat as a character and that compelled me through the book. The examination of the occult in the early 1930s and the impact of different esoteric movements on world culture hit every mark for me. I appreciated the focus, as always, on Mexican culture and Mexican film, reclaiming something that so often is defaulted to American.

It was an excellent book, I’d recommend you to read it and to look out for her other work.