Reviews with content warning for Police brutality - Hurricane Season

I can see why this book has gained so much acclaim. It is well written, gripping, and intense. This is not a happy story but one that focuses on the bad in peoples' lives and how that affects them, usually for the worse. The mystery is solved rather quickly however we also get to see the aftermath of this and how it further destroys those involved.

Content Warnings

corinnereads7's review against another edition

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dark mysterious tense medium-paced

Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.5

“They called her the Witch, the same as her mother; the Young Witch when she first started trading in curses and cures, and then, when she wound up alone, the year of the landslide, simply the Witch."

Reading this book was like living through a violent, chaotic fever dream. HURRICANE SEASON is beyond fucked up. It is gory, graphic, and extremely disturbing. At times I found myself wanting to throw this book in the trash and set it on fire just so I wouldn’t have to continue reading the vile descriptions of horrendous acts of violence. That being said, I think the author intended to give us an unblinking look into the world of machismo culture, to make her readers see how destructive misogyny and homophobia truly are.

I wouldn’t say I “enjoyed” this book, but I did find myself glued to the pages while the mystery of the Witch was slowly unveiled. Sophie Hughes did a fantastic job of translating this odd novel from the original Spanish, with its long, twisty sentences that sometimes occupy two or three pages before returning to their initial intended point. I do wish she had found an alternative for the r-word though - or do translators not have the agency of choosing their words?

In a strange way, this book reminds me of ‘Sula’ by Toni Morrison. Like Sula, the Witch was ostracized from the community of La Matosa (unless of course, she was providing money or services) and cast as the source of all the town’s darkest indulgences. She was the scapegoat to be blamed for everyone else’s behavior, so that nobody would have to take responsibility for their own actions, least of all the men of the town.

If you can name a trigger warning, it’s probably in this book.

Content Warnings

katie_greenwinginmymouth's review against another edition

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challenging dark medium-paced

Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

Wow what a book to end 2020 on! Everything you’ve read about this book is true, it is fierce, challenging, unrelentingly and brutal. It literally gave me nightmares last night. Content warning for extreme violence, murder, rape, homophobia, sexual abuse... you get the picture. However the real thing that is striking about this book is the writing.

Each chapter is written from a different person’s perspective and the story of how the body of ‘the witch’ has come to end up rotting in the canal where it is discovered at the start of the book is revealed gradually and paced perfectly. The written style is very much like reading someone’s internal narrative or as if they are gossiping about what’s happened. Sentences run on into each other, tangents are followed and bits of the narrative are repeated and altered. In fact some chapters are virtually one long sentence. For that reason it really pays to set aside enough time to read each chapter in one go without a pause.

Everyone in this story is implicated in some way and everyone has their own reasons to tell only a partial history of what’s happened. It’s a phenomenally good way of telling a story that is set in a small, isolated community where rumours spread easily and where extreme economic hardships and changing social structures are testing any small sense of community there is left. I think Melchor does a good job of showing the context within which this community is living and the circumstances that drive people to behave in such brutal ways, touching on police and political corruption, patriarchal society and organised religion and changes in industry and employment opportunities (or lack of). If you can stomach it I highly recommend this.

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ross_f's review against another edition

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challenging dark emotional mysterious sad tense fast-paced

Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.5

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sophiewelsh's review against another edition

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challenging dark emotional sad medium-paced

Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? Yes

2.0

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