Set in 1950 in Mexico, this book appealed to me initially because the cover is so beautiful and because I’ve loved gothic tales since I was a young reader. I have to say, the book did not disappoint. It definitely lived up to the promise made by the cover. It was creepy and had just the right touch of horror.

The author is very adept at descriptions. Her moldy, genteel, neglected manor house was sufficiently sinister and so easy to picture with the atmospheric way the author detailed the wallpaper, the darkness of the place, the shadows and the crumbling textures of the various rooms. Not much electrical light in the house and the use of candles and lanterns added to the eerie atmosphere.

The inhabitants of the home were also well-drawn. The patriarch of the family the heroine came to stay with when she was concerned about her cousin was utterly horrific and macabre. The way the author conjured him and his smelly breath and scent of decay was absolutely divine (if you like creep-tastic descriptions).  I could almost smell the nastiness rolling off him. It was deliciously horrifying.

One character I loved to hate was the female resident of the house—not the heroine’s cousin, but the mother of the only remotely normal person (and that’s saying a lot) in the house. This woman was awful and just completely unkind to the heroine. No talking at dinner, controlling her son, controlling the heroine’s cousin and just being an all-around hateful person. I wanted to smack her.  

The story itself had traditional elements of the gothic genre as well as a lot of horror elements. It kind of reminded me of the movie Crimson Peak–at least in the descriptions of the manor house that had fallen into disrepair and neglect.  Mold and mushrooms were a big theme in the story and I don’t think I’ve ever been so unsettled by mushrooms in my life. I loved it, though.

A sense of foreboding which is essential to gothic stories was seeped into every page after the first chapter or two. The dawning horror the heroine faced built in a fabulous manner and by the last few chapters, I was on edge for her and wondered how the author was going to resolve the dilemmas our heroine found herself in.

I usually figure out stories really early on, but this one had some twists and turns I didn’t see coming and I really enjoyed that. All in all, this was a great read. Not sure I want to eat any mushrooms after that, though.  🙂