Ecogothic

From the title on, Mexican Gothic, the latest from Mexican Canadian novelist Silvia Moreno-Garcia, leaves no doubt about its genre or its self-awareness. Fans of the Gothic will find all its greatest hits lined up and ready for savoring – the crumbling house, the family with a secret, fraught sexual dynamics, ghosts of a restless past. Moreno-Garcia delivers it all with gusto. But more than mere homage, the novel’s pulpy plot invites a closer read to its treatment of race, colonialism, patriarchy – and some very scary ecology.

Moreno-Garcia locates her Gothic in 1950s Mexico; her heroine is Noemí Taboada, a high society beauty sent to check in on her beloved cousin, Catalina. Recently married to English expat Virgil Doyle, proud owner of a defunct silver mine, Catalina’s rambling letters home have aroused her family’s concern. No swooning damsel, Noemí is vibrant, cunning, and sharp-tongued. She’ll needs all that and more to escape the machinations of the Doyle family, who decide to make the most of Noemí’s intrusion.

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