Review by llunari - The Bewitching

llunari 's review for:

The Bewitching by Silvia Moreno-Garcia

4.75

dark mysterious tense slow-paced

Plot or Character Driven: Plot

Strong character development: No

Loveable characters: Complicated

Diverse cast of characters: Yes

Flaws of characters a main focus: Complicated

Holy crap???

Last year, I went to SMG’s book tour for The Seventh Veil of Salome and when she teased this book? I KNEW I needed to read it. Witches in a horror historical setting? Let’s GO!

As a writer myself, I was able to pick up on the foreshadowing and predicted the Who about 15% of the way in, but I could still appreciate the craft of sprinkling the hints between the pages, and the dread of wanting the characters to figure it out in time, to BELIEVE. Felt like I was going insane too because what if I AM wrong? (I wasn’t!!!)

I also felt so sick to my stomach, watching beloved characters be tortured for someone else’s greed. (I wonder what kind of horrors someone evil would exact with magic—if they haven’t already.) And a massive warning for incest. It made my skin crawl; unfortunately, incest in Mexican families hides itself in despicable ways, and the way SMG highlighted it felt too familiar to patterns in my own family I heard about.

SMG always does a good job at highlighting something good and something awful from Mexico. Maybe that’s why I love her books so much. She always makes them feel real.

Since I read Mexican Gothic, I had to yet to feel the same for another SMG book—don’t get me wrong, I love many other books of hers, but none spiked the unease and intrigue in me that Mexican Gothic did. And here it is again: The Bewitching captured me between its teeth (🥁)

SMG does it again!

Content Warnings