Velvet Was the Night is the second novel written by Silvia Moreno-Garcia that I have read, the first being Mexican Gothic, which I reviewed in May. I like Mexican Gothic better, despite the strange turn it takes towards the end, because I prefer gothic over noir; however, I still found Velvet Was the Night to be an engrossing read.
I highly recommend The Wolf Den by Elodie Harper. I started reading it with no expectations and was pleasantly surprised by how much I ended up enjoying it.
Pandora’s Jar by Natalie Haynes is not what I thought it would be. I must have been so excited about a new Natalie Haynes book that I did not comprehend the synopsis before I bought it. I thought it would be a collection of short stories she wrote about the women featured in Greek myths. Instead, it is an examination of Greek myths where Haynes uses her extensive knowledge of Greek mythology to trace how white men changed the origin stories of Greek mythological women to suit their own ideas of women. But even though it turned out to be a completely different book from what I thought I would be reading, Pandora’s Jar is an interesting book. If you have any interest at all in Greek mythology, I think you will find this book interesting as well.
If I were to use only one word to describe The Maid by Nita Prose, it would be “cute”, much like the cat in the above picture. Do you ever have one of those days where you feel like the weight of the world has got you down, and you just want to lay on the couch or on a beach and watch/read something light-hearted and enjoyable? Well, The Maid is the novel you want to read the next time you are in that kind of mood.
The first time I read The Historian was way back in 2005 when it was first published. I liked it enough back then to read Kostova’s next novel, The Swan Thieves (which I have read more than once), and I decided to reread it now to see if I would still like it all these years later. If you like historical fiction, The Historian is a fascinating novel, but at the same time it can feel like a bit of a slog to read.