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Rating: 2.5 out of 5

Genre: Horror, Historical Fiction

People who should read this: If you love historical fiction with a horror twist, an interesting ending, and a diverse lead. 

This was the exact book I needed to read after suffering through The Tenth Girl… *she said sarcastically* 

At least I was better prepared for the ending. 

Mexican Gothic looked like the perfect book to kick off the spooky season (that’s if I ignore the actual book I started with). Not only was everyone raving about it, but I loved the idea of a horror twist on a historical fiction book set in Mexico. Also, I’m suddenly into the 50s and 60s, so it seemed that this book was going to check off a lot of boxes for me. 

However…

I’m clearly not the fan that everyone else seems to be. 

Issue number one is a more personal one. I’m not a fan of Moreno-Garcia’s writing style. Where some books go overboard in their descriptions, Mexican Gothic was lacking that element to immerse me in the world. There was no atmosphere for me besides the mold and fog. This surface level writing becomes a major issue when I want to connect with the characters. Instead, I was annoyed with how many times the mold on the wall was mentioned. If it was foreshadowing, I got it the first two times.

Then we get to the twist at the end and well… I wasn’t the book’s biggest fan. It’s believable. I was ready for it. I just didn’t really care overall. By that point I wanted to know who was going to live or die. Or in truth, I was too far in not to finish the book so I could count it towards my reading challenge. 

It’s not that there was anything extremely wrong with Mexican Gothic, I was just bored. It wasn’t scary enough to hold my interest. The world was cramped in a single house. The characters left me without a care. And when we got to the horror part, I was too grossed out to enjoy it any more. That and the little bit of suspense that was there was gone. 

The idea was interesting, the payoff, not so much.

Which is a real shame because I’ve got Moreno-Garcia on my TBR list a couple of times. There’s hope though, because her other books aren’t horror. Maybe horror is just her kryptonite.

Happy Reading

Love Kait

Reading Challenge: 157/175