Author(s): Mariana Enriquez

Fiction | Mel M's Book Talkers

A city seethes with murderous intentions, family betrayals and morbid desires in this masterpiece of contemporary Gothic. Welcome to Buenos Aires, a place of nightmares and twisted imaginings, where missing children come back from the dead and unearthed bones carry terrible curses. Thrumming with murderous intentions, family betrayals and morbid desires, these stories shine a light on a violent city gripped by urban madness; giving voice to the lost, the oppressed and the forgotten. Lucid and darkly poetic, unsettling and otherworldly, these tales of revenge, witchcraft and fetishes are a masterpiece of contemporary Gothic and a bewitching exploration of the dark inclinations that threaten to lead us over the edge.

CONSTANT READER STAFF REVIEW: MEL M

I picked this up as a fan of short horror fiction and I wasn’t disappointed. Enriquez has a truly macabre mind and it’s a perverse delight to appreciate that, but many of these stories remind me of how the horror genre can be in service of compassion and fidelity to supressed histories.

Enriquez seems particularly preoccupied with the consequences of the Argentinian dictatorship in the 70s-80s. Learning about this era of Argentinian history through the mode of horror fiction was very affecting, and even if some of the stories’ structures meander, none of them are ‘filler’.  

You will find this worthwhile if you enjoyed Nona Fernandez’s The Twilight Zone, or if you’re a fan of darker fiction with a feminist/social consciousness.