SILVIA MORENO-GARCIA The Bewitching. Reviewed by Robert Goodman

Silvia Moreno-Garcia mixes Mexican mythology with the history of US witchcraft in this new novel, once again reinventing genre tropes.

Silvia Moreno-Garcia is one of the most varied – and consistently interesting – authors in modern fantasy and horror. She is constantly reinventing classic fantasy and horror tropes and concepts, usually including a Mexican twist. Moreno-Garcia came to many readers’ notice with Mexican Gothic, which played on classic British gothic tropes, but she has also dipped into vampires (Certain Dark Things), classic science fiction (The Daughter of Doctor Moreau) and B-grade horror and haunted films (Silver Nitrate). In her latest book, The Bewitching, she takes on the subject of witches, drawing a line between Mexican mythology and the long history of witchcraft in the New England area of the United States.

The Bewitching is told over three timeframes. The connective tissue is the story of Minerva, set in 1998. Minerva has come from Mexico to do a postgraduate degree at Stoneridge College in New England. Her area of study is an underappreciated female horror author, Beatrice Tremblay, famous for a single book called The Vanishing. Minerva has become interested in Tremblay through her fascination with HP Lovecraft.

Her name … had incited Minerva’s curiosity because Lovecraft and Tremblay had apparently corresponded on the subject of witchcraft, and also because she was a woman and a writer of ‘weird tales’, a combination that, although not unique by itself – Greye La Spina, Everil Worrell, and Mary Elizabeth Counselman were women who wrote such stories – was noteworthy because history seemed to have forgotten most female horror authors.

That book was based on the disappearance of Beatrice’s roommate Virginia from the same college back in 1934, and Minerva, keen to explore that time, is given access to Tremblay’s notebooks by a rich benefactor. These notebooks provide the story of the lead-up to Virginia’s disappearance, and form the second strand of the novel. The third narrative strand is set in Mexico in 1908 and is the story of Minerva’s great-grandmother Alba, whose family farm starts to come under what seems to be supernatural pressure after the disappearance of her brother. Alba begins to believe that her family and the farm are being targeted by a witch.

But most dangerous were the witches who sucked human blood and devoured the hearts of men, for in the heart resides the life force of creatures. The teyolloquani was formidable, the kind of being you spoke about in a murmur for fear of summoning it.

It is Minerva who brings the two earlier time frames together and recognises the echoes of these stories:

It was interesting how Nana Alba had also told her a story of a disappearance that was tied to witchcraft, just as Beatrice Tremblay’s novel had connections with the occult.

And at the same time, Minerva finds that perhaps she is in the middle of one of those stories herself, only slowly realising that an odd disappearance, eerie noises in the woods and dead animals may be signs that there is a witch in her life also.

Moreno-Garcia has shown time and again her ability to build dread and suspense. She layers on small, discomforting details and slightly off characters to keep the reader unbalanced. Each of the three tales is complete in and of itself, and delivers a unique central character and milieu. But they also build on each other, giving partial clues to form a complete understanding as they each work separately to their climax, to the point where the stories start to merge in the final few chapters.

In The Bewitching, Moreno-Garcia also manages to seamlessly bring together two different traditions – Mexican stories of witchcraft and the long association of the New England area with witches. In doing so she finds the universal in these stories (pausing at one point to compare them to tales of witchcraft in other cultures). Through her New England setting she also pays homage to some of the horror greats who also set their tales in New England – authors like Lovecraft and Stephen King – but also name-checks many of the women who wrote in this genre.

With The Bewitching Moreno-Garcia once again deconstructs and reinterprets a tale of supernatural horror in a way that is compelling and illuminating but also in some respects universal. She delivers three intertwined stories of young women who are battling to believe, understand and push against the supernatural forces arrayed against them. In doing so, not only does Moreno-Garcia pay homage to the writers who have come before her, but once again demonstrates her claim to be considered one of the best and most interesting present-day writers of the supernatural.

Silvia Moreno-Garcia The Bewitching Arcadia 2025 PB 400pp $34.99

Robert Goodman is an institutionalised public servant and obsessive reader, who won a science fiction short-story competition very early in his career but has found reviewing a better outlet for his skills. He was a judge of the Ned Kelly Awards for many years and reviews for a number of other publications – see his website: www.pilebythebed.com

You can buy The Bewitching from Abbey’s at a 10% discount by quoting the promotion code NEWTOWNREVIEW.

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Tags: genre tropes, Mexican mythology, Mexican writers, Silvia | Moreno-Garcia, witchcraft in New England USA, witches, women writers