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3.8 AVERAGE
3.8 AVERAGE
dark
emotional
mysterious
reflective
sad
tense
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
An ok read. Some points really had me intrigued, but then nothing really came from them. Seems like a combo of dealings with feelings of loss and family trauma.
I hadn’t anticipated a book that was advertised as “haunted by a cursed Alexa” would have gotten to me so well. I got through this entire thing in a single day (it’s pretty short) and I was more or less enthralled start to finish.
At its base, it’s a story about grief, loss, guilt, and love. It asks questions like “how am I supposed to move on after my life ends?” Or “why does everything I touch seem to die?” Then t blends them with interesting cultural dimensions like familial expectations, taboo, and identity, and wraps it up with spirituality, the abstract, the beyond. Then it amplifies all of this through a lens of horror.
The prose was beautiful, and Thiago is a compelling narrator. His despair, depression, grief, and sadness drips from the pages, yet it’s apparent that under the numbness is a person who cares a lot.
The weakest part of the novel is the horror elements. They seemed a little passé. Elements of 2001 (literally referenced in the text), Pet Sematary, and some sort of quasi-lovecraft are drawn from for the more concrete horror elements, which caused the final act to drag slightly as everything became just a little too predictable.
However, as a piece of character work, this was a gorgeous exploration of what loss does to ours and our surrounding communications and world at large. At the end, I just felt a little numb and emotionally drained, which was exactly the desired outcome. 4/5.
At its base, it’s a story about grief, loss, guilt, and love. It asks questions like “how am I supposed to move on after my life ends?” Or “why does everything I touch seem to die?” Then t blends them with interesting cultural dimensions like familial expectations, taboo, and identity, and wraps it up with spirituality, the abstract, the beyond. Then it amplifies all of this through a lens of horror.
The prose was beautiful, and Thiago is a compelling narrator. His despair, depression, grief, and sadness drips from the pages, yet it’s apparent that under the numbness is a person who cares a lot.
The weakest part of the novel is the horror elements. They seemed a little passé. Elements of 2001 (literally referenced in the text), Pet Sematary, and some sort of quasi-lovecraft are drawn from for the more concrete horror elements, which caused the final act to drag slightly as everything became just a little too predictable.
However, as a piece of character work, this was a gorgeous exploration of what loss does to ours and our surrounding communications and world at large. At the end, I just felt a little numb and emotionally drained, which was exactly the desired outcome. 4/5.
challenging
dark
tense
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
dark
emotional
mysterious
tense
fast-paced
dark
emotional
mysterious
tense
medium-paced
A bit off the rails, but I didn’t mind. Loved the Mexican American perspective intertwined with cosmic horror. A creative take on grief.
emotional
mysterious
sad
tense
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
No
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
Content Warnings
Moderate: Animal death, Body horror, Death, Violence, Blood
dark
mysterious
sad
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
I don’t quite know what I think of this book. I feel like I enjoyed it, but I also am not very much a fan of ambiguous endings and it definitely has an ambiguous ending.
The only time I feel content with an ambiguous or “unfinished” ending is when I feel like they serve a specific purpose. I feel like the ambiguity left at the end of this book did not serve a specific purpose though (but I might be missing things too).
Overall, the book was an interesting read and kept me engaged. I definitely felts scared and uneasy throughout a lot of it which was part of the intent and I think it was done well in that sense. Also multiple times I was very invested in what was happening and wanted to see the end and that kept me reading.
Despite all of this though, I felt like I never fully understood what happened in the end. If you are trying to avoid spoilers don’t read beyond this point.
At the end it is obvious Thiago is possessed and it seems as if he kind of succumbs to it and “dies” by taking his seat at the table. It’s really depressing him kind of taking his place in this banquet that is very clearly not a good or enjoyable thing and that in an of itself is a clear ending that the book does provide. I think that the correlation to his father at the end is potentially a commentary on like familial “curses” or like weights passed on through families, but there is still a lot unanswered.
I think what I’m most frustrated with is there still seems to be an entity, something that possessed him, something that causes all of this, yet at the end we don’t clearly know who that entity is, how it came to be here, why it chose him, what it is trying to get out of all of this, etc.
Because this entity is present and because these experiences are very pointed, I struggle to see the entity as a grim reaper figure because it is clear in the book that this is not a universal experience of humanity and that it was very localized in fact.
Maybe it was a haunting for haunting sake and maybe the haunting in and of itself caused him to, like he said, see the worst part of himself, but I wish more clarity had been provided concerning this haunting/possessing entity.
The cook seems to be the personification of the entity as he is the only person not directly related or important to Thiago in all of the weird otherworldly scenes. But even he doesn’t really seem to fully understand everything. It seems he is orchestrating it but also a part of it. Even if he doesn’t understand everything though, we still don’t get to understand what he is at the end of the story and that frustrates me.
In one sense, I think this has some clear messages and meanings that can be pulled. But, in another sense, I think it left so much ambiguity about the who, what, why, and how surrounding the entity that I don’t feel like I was given a clear conclusion or understanding.
Potentially, the author didn’t provide the who, what, why, how on purpose and that ambiguity about the entity driving these events is also meant to be a message or statement to the reader, but if that’s the case I am having trouble understanding.
I am not very much a fan of books with ambiguous endings, but this was better than a lot of books I’ve read with ambiguous endings, so I will give it that.
The only time I feel content with an ambiguous or “unfinished” ending is when I feel like they serve a specific purpose. I feel like the ambiguity left at the end of this book did not serve a specific purpose though (but I might be missing things too).
Overall, the book was an interesting read and kept me engaged. I definitely felts scared and uneasy throughout a lot of it which was part of the intent and I think it was done well in that sense. Also multiple times I was very invested in what was happening and wanted to see the end and that kept me reading.
Despite all of this though, I felt like I never fully understood what happened in the end. If you are trying to avoid spoilers don’t read beyond this point.
At the end it is obvious Thiago is possessed and it seems as if he kind of succumbs to it and “dies” by taking his seat at the table. It’s really depressing him kind of taking his place in this banquet that is very clearly not a good or enjoyable thing and that in an of itself is a clear ending that the book does provide. I think that the correlation to his father at the end is potentially a commentary on like familial “curses” or like weights passed on through families, but there is still a lot unanswered.
I think what I’m most frustrated with is there still seems to be an entity, something that possessed him, something that causes all of this, yet at the end we don’t clearly know who that entity is, how it came to be here, why it chose him, what it is trying to get out of all of this, etc.
Because this entity is present and because these experiences are very pointed, I struggle to see the entity as a grim reaper figure because it is clear in the book that this is not a universal experience of humanity and that it was very localized in fact.
Maybe it was a haunting for haunting sake and maybe the haunting in and of itself caused him to, like he said, see the worst part of himself, but I wish more clarity had been provided concerning this haunting/possessing entity.
The cook seems to be the personification of the entity as he is the only person not directly related or important to Thiago in all of the weird otherworldly scenes. But even he doesn’t really seem to fully understand everything. It seems he is orchestrating it but also a part of it. Even if he doesn’t understand everything though, we still don’t get to understand what he is at the end of the story and that frustrates me.
In one sense, I think this has some clear messages and meanings that can be pulled. But, in another sense, I think it left so much ambiguity about the who, what, why, and how surrounding the entity that I don’t feel like I was given a clear conclusion or understanding.
Potentially, the author didn’t provide the who, what, why, how on purpose and that ambiguity about the entity driving these events is also meant to be a message or statement to the reader, but if that’s the case I am having trouble understanding.
I am not very much a fan of books with ambiguous endings, but this was better than a lot of books I’ve read with ambiguous endings, so I will give it that.
dark
mysterious
sad
tense
medium-paced