Reviews with content warning for Police brutality - Temporada de huracanes

I struggled to write a review that would do this book justice. If you have the time, I recommend you read M John Harrison and Anthony Cummin's reviews (both published by the Guardian).

In short, this is a brutal book and it's not going to be for everyone. The reading experience is shocking, repulsive, but its lingering effect is profound.

A local Witch is found dead, throat slit, floating in a canal. What follows is a whirlwind exploration of life in a rural Mexican town - its constricting familial relations, sexual violence, and deadly masculinity.

Besides the 'bookending' chapters that function as an introduction and conclusion, each chapter of Hurricane Season is a different character's "retelling" of the circumstances of the murder. I use quotation marks because, truthfully, it's less of a retelling and more of a character study showcasing that person's life, motivations and anxieties, with clues to the Witch's death threaded in between, leaving the reader to piece together what happened and why certain events were interpreted in a particular way.

It's undoubtedly a challenging read, but one that will stick with me for a long time.

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klwooster's review against another edition

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challenging dark sad medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

4.0

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dogmp3's review against another edition

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dark funny mysterious sad tense fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

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lowercase_a's review against another edition

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challenging dark reflective tense fast-paced

4.5

O Verdadeiro Horror de Ser Latino-Americano

O brilhantismo de Fernanda Melchor floresce em meio aos canaviais e o sol impiedoso de La Matosa, pedaço de terra e de gente esquecida pelo resto do mundo, pelos oito capítulos mais atordoantes que já li, um testemunho da desgraça alheia que é nossa, e o que torna esse romace assombração não é a perpétua condenação das mulheres entre si ou as cenas gráficas do fatídico assassinato ou sentir o desfazer dos personagens na palma de nossas mãos pela falta de dinheiro, pela vergonha, pelo ódio, pelas drogas, pela faca, pelo abandono, pelos punhos, pela culpa, pela ostrisização, pelo abuso, pela ignorância mas, o que torna o horror latente, é a compreensão visceral de que por traz (senão pela frente) de toda cidade latino-americana existe La Matosa e que essa desgraça nunca foi alheia, essa desgraça toda é nossa e por traz de toda garganta colonizada guarda um grito igual a voz deste livro: atroz e sanguinária.

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