Reviews tagging 'Death'

The Hacienda by Isabel Cañas

150 reviews

rojo25's review against another edition

dark mysterious tense medium-paced

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

4.0

---

Content Warnings

Moderate: Death, Racism, Religious bigotry, and Violence

fifteenthjessica's review against another edition

dark emotional mysterious tense 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? Yes

4.0

Beatriz is desperate to escape the household of her mother's cousin, where she is forced to work as a scullery maid due to her mestizo heritage, and she thinks marriage to Rodolfo Solorzano, a wealthy hacienda owner in the country, is the key to a life for her and her mother similar to the one they lost when her father was killed in the Mexican Revolution. However, the Hacienda is anything but a refuge. Servants and Rodolfo's sister avoid it at night, no one really knows what happened to Rodolfo's first wife, shadows move on their own, areas of the house are unnaturally cold, and Beatriz is haunted by visions of blood. Beatriz's only hope of rescue is Andres, a mestizo priest with ties to the hacienda and supernatural powers that he's suppressed out of fear of the Inquisition.

It's a horror and historic fiction hybrid, and while I don't read the former much and can't say how well it holds up to others (it's the best of the few I've read), but the historic fiction aspects are excellent. Isabel Canas shows an expertise of the era of history she has set this in, and I think she gets around the issue of delivering exposition about the setting to readers less familiar with life in the era by making its presence related to some of the emotional wounds of her primary characters and really most of the cast. Canas demonstrates an excellent knowledge of how social issues like sexism, racism, colorism, and classism impact people/characters, and I find it hard to completely hate most of the antagonists.

The prose is gorgeous and at times macabre. I (and a few members of the book club I read this for) quickly learned that reading it at night is not a good idea as we were quite jumpy afterwards.

It's not a flawless debut. While the book focuses heavily on the casta class system in Mexico, the few members of the servant class that get development is almost entirely Andres and his family, which I think slightly undercuts the theme. Rodolfo also feels more like a plot device than a character, which I'm not sure how I feel about it. His decision to leave the hacienda in Beatriz and Juana's hands while he rubs elbows with politicians in the capital is necessary for character motivation, it leaves him underdeveloped, and readers are left on their own to reconcile the Rodolfo who his first wife adores and the one who (sexual abuse mention and a spoiler)

rapes serving girls and hides Beatriz's letters from her mother.

There is also something about the ending that left a bad taste in my mouth.

Beatriz's mother inherits a small home from her husband's family and moves into it while Beatriz is surviving her husband's home and invites her to come. Something about the knowledge that if Beatriz waited she'd have a home that she didn't have to fight a malevolent spirit to survive in feels unsatisfactory. Returning to her mother fits with the other theme of home, and I don't know how else to do that in a way that isn't majorly depressing. Plus, Beatriz grows as a person and initiates healing for Andres and his extended family as well as the hacienda itself through her actions, so it's not a total let down.

---

Content Warnings

Graphic: Sexism, Blood, Classism, Colonisation, Misogyny, and Racism

Moderate: Cursing, Gore, Murder, Violence, Animal death, Child abuse, Confinement, Death, Emotional abuse, Fire/Fire injury, Gaslighting, Infidelity, Injury/Injury detail, Mental illness, and Physical abuse

Minor: Rape, Sexual content, Abortion, Alcohol, Vomit, and War

itsheyfay's review

challenging dark mysterious reflective sad tense medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? It's complicated

3.5

Neat premise but it was nothing to sing home about.

---

Content Warnings

Graphic: Blood, Body horror, Injury/Injury detail, Death, Death of parent, Classism, and Murder

Moderate: Grief, Rape, Abortion, Cursing, Gaslighting, Fire/Fire injury, Sexual assault, Pregnancy, and Confinement

Minor: Physical abuse, War, and Torture

bookishcori's review against another edition

adventurous dark mysterious fast-paced

4.5

---

Content Warnings

Graphic: Blood, Death, and Murder

Moderate: War, Colonisation, Racism, and Classism

blacksphinx's review against another edition

dark emotional slow-paced

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

3.5

---

Content Warnings

Graphic: Injury/Injury detail, Blood, Death, Violence, Racism, and Fire/Fire injury

Moderate: Sexism

Minor: Physical abuse, Abortion, Vomit, Religious bigotry, Death of parent, and Rape

amberinpieces's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional mysterious tense medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Plot
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? No

3.5

---

Content Warnings

Graphic: Blood, Body horror, Gore, Murder, and Death

Moderate: Classism, Colonisation, Injury/Injury detail, and Fire/Fire injury

Minor: Alcohol, Gaslighting, Grief, Rape, Misogyny, Racism, Confinement, Death of parent, Sexism, Religious bigotry, Infidelity, Cursing, and Pregnancy

vaguely_pink's review

dark mysterious tense medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.5

---

Content Warnings

Graphic: Death, Murder, Racism, Blood, Fire/Fire injury, and Gaslighting

Moderate: Classism, Gore, Alcohol, War, Violence, and Body horror

Minor: Colonisation, Confinement, Cursing, Police brutality, Pregnancy, Rape, Death of parent, Grief, Infidelity, Religious bigotry, Sexual content, Vomit, Animal death, and Abortion

carinakastano's review against another edition

adventurous dark mysterious tense medium-paced

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

2.5

it's definitely a book.

overall, this book isn't offensive and it's not bad by any means: either i went into this book with different expectations or the execution could've been better.

CONS:

• the author focused way too much on the Romance, and I wasn't expecting that but maybe that's on me if I didn't read the synopsis correctly. Beatriz and Andres are kind of cute but also they basically just trauma bonded and they don't know much about each other so i couldn't root for them and i didn't care about them until the very end

• as for the 'horror' part of this book, we kept hearing how bad all these people were but we didn't see any of it until the end. we were told the Solorzanos are so bad but we're not shown much of it, and what we are shown goes by in a flash and it doesn't leave a lasting impression. it is also shown right at the very end, which would've been fine if we were taken along for the ride and didn't know they were bad from literally day 1. 

• sure some dark stuff happens before our story
  Catalina and Mariana's death, and the assaults from Rodolfo
  but with the descriptions given by the author, I didn't feel the creepiness or the eeriness of what Beatriz was feeling in the Hacienda and while reading it was hard to feel like she was in any real danger.
  
  
• if it was all in her head, she was letting the entity in and she had the power to not experience all the hallucinations then what was the point ??? the only thing she had to do was grow a pair ??? some confidence could've solved all our problems, lol ok

•  
  how am i supposed to care that she wants to be with her mom at the end over her hunky man if we didn't see that relationship? I have no emotional tie to Beatriz's love for her mom, and sure it kinda made sense, but I just didn't care

• there were parts that felt like they dragged on and it would've worked better with 100 less pages
  
  

PROS:

• the final 1/3 was definitely the best part for me: it was finally fun, we finally saw more of people's dark side, it felt like we were getting somewhere and this is when i started to feel tense and oh my gosh is she going to be okay? I did like Beatriz's friendship with Paloma: honestly that was the best thing about this book for me and I was definitely more scared for Paloma than for our MC

---

Content Warnings

Graphic: Murder and Death

Moderate: Sexual assault

Minor: Injury/Injury detail

caseythereader's review

challenging dark mysterious sad tense slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Plot
• Strong character development? No
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

3.75

Thanks to PRH Audio for the free copy of this book.

 - If you read REBECCA and wished it was about a literal haunting instead of a psychological one, THE HACIENDA is the book for you.
- The audio version of this book is a tense, visceral experience, with narrators Lee Osorio and Victoria Villarreal infusing the words with urgency and painting vivid images of the terrifying scenes at San Isidro. 

---

Content Warnings

Graphic: Injury/Injury detail, Murder, Racism, Death, Alcohol, Gore, Blood, Classism, Fire/Fire injury, and Infidelity

Moderate: Abortion, Cursing, and Sexual violence

mamawantsbooks's review against another edition

dark mysterious tense fast-paced

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

4.25

---

Content Warnings

Graphic: Abortion, Rape, Murder, Fire/Fire injury, Death of parent, Animal death, Confinement, Xenophobia, Pregnancy, Injury/Injury detail, Domestic abuse, and Death