Silver Nitrate

I'm not much of a horror girlie, so when I got an ALC of this book, I wasn't sure if I would like it. I decided to read it for the fall in the lead-up to Halloween. It's a mix of Lovecraftian-style horror, film, and Mexican history, which is a great starter horror for people who are scaredy cats lol. Moreno-Garcia touches on a magic system that touches on Nazism, racism, and classism and proves that magic is not just for white elites. The concept that Ewers, the main villain, was a thief who stole magic practices from other practitioners is similar to the way that colonizers have appropriated facets of indigenous cultures and twisted them for their own purposes. Montserrat and Tristán's battle against the forces they awaken with Abel is intriguing and kept my attention. I am a horrible audiobook reader, so it took me over a month to finish, but that's because I get distracted easily, so I listened in small chunks until I finished.

The book is slow to start, and the first 25% is very character-driven and focused on Montserrat and Tristán, which is why it took some time to slog through that portion of the book. Once they meet Abel Urueta, the action really picks up. The complexity of the characters got me hooked, and throughout the book, they work together seamlessly. It was refreshing to have Montserrat as a heroine who knew her shit and didn't take shit from anyone. The dynamic between her and Tristán was intriguing and a little codependent on Tristán's side.

If you are looking for a refreshing horror novel that is easy for beginning horror readers, check this out. This isn't a fast, breezy, and gory read, which I appreciated, but if that's your jam, this book is not for you. I have physical copies of Mexican Gothic and Certain Dark Things, and this is leading me to push them up my TBR.

Thank you to Libro.fm for the ALC, and this is my honest review.

Cool premise: filmmaking and horror/occult from the writer of Mexican Gothic. She seems to have researched the films and filmmaking elements very well. I also liked that it was set in Mexico City, an urban area with different cultural and pop culture references than my own. The story itself had some potential, could make a fun movie perhaps. It is similar to a Friday the 13th (television series about the antique shop, not the films) episode.

Despite the potential, it didn't hold my interest. It's a short book but there is so much telling rather than showing and repeating information. The author gave us the main character's specific thoughts and feelings all the time instead of letting the reader figure out what the characters are experiencing based on behavior. This tends to flatten out rather than add depth to characters.

Without the repeated information, the reader could piece things together from what they read. She either doesn't trust the reader to figure things out or is in need of an editor. I got impatient and skimmed a lot while reading.

The chapters where the conflict starts to heat up were more entertaining. Ye1, it is difficult to have a menacing villain when he's already dead. Yes, I know, Voldemort, but in Silver Nitrate, it is not as effective. His two grande dame co-conspirators were slightly scarier. I did like the inky dogs.

Thus begins my horror novel marathon for 2023. I hope they get better.

There's always that sense of excitement when Silvia Moreno-Garcia has a new book coming out. In part, it's because you know you're in for something that has her signature style, but will not be retreading on territory covered in previous books. For the most part.

Silver Nitrate is a marvelous supernatural book set in Mexico in the 80s, focusing on their film and television industry. We follow Montserrat, an audio editor for a local film house, and Tristan, a disgraced telenovela star who's scarred up face has him doing voiceover work instead of being the leading man he was. Their shared love of campy horror flicks and a chance encounter with a retired local horror director, Abel, leads them down a dark path of helping him complete one of his lost films that's kept on rare (and volatile) silver nitrate stock.

Of course, Abel was working on the film with a former Nazi occultist who'd embedded spells in the film, and his untimely death left the spell chain broken, which Abel felt led to the end of his career and a string of bad luck. When Montserrat and Tristan promise to help finish by providing voiceover for the film and help complete the spells, their luck changes for a brief period before, well... as one of Abel's former friends Jose puts it, they set off a magical nuclear bomb and played right into that Nazi's hands of looking for immortality.

There's a lot of love put into this novel, with a focus on old horror flicks and Mexico's film scene and tons of occult stuff. Lots of research went into making sure everything felt right, and it shows. Much like Velvet Was the Night, this book is dripping with style, tension and is a joy to read. I found myself not reading too much at a time for the explicit purpose of not wanting to finish it too quickly, which is always a good sign.

Moreno-Garcia has a rare talent for making immensely readable books that still pack deep thematic elements for those willing to look beyond the well-crafted plots.

Thanks to NetGalley for the review copy.