The complex female characters are particular standouts. The narrative shifts effortlessly between fantasy, horror, and romance, helmed by a well-shaded cast. From the New York Times bestselling author of The Daughter of Doctor Moreau and Mexican Gothic comes a fabulous meld of Mexican horror movies and Nazi occultism: a dark thriller about the curse that haunts a legendary lost filmand awakens one woman’s hidden powers. Combining real history with unsettling magic, Moreno-Garcia effortlessly ties explorations of misogyny, addiction, antisemitism, and racism into a plot that never falters from its breakneck pace. Abel convinces Montserrat and Tristán that finishing the film with him will finish the original spell and bring them all luck-only for their endeavors to draw forth something very different from the dark. Abel claims the screenplay was written by Nazi occultist Wilhelm Ewers, who meant to use the film to cast a luck spell, but following Ewers’s sudden death the spell was inverted. Tristán finds a similarly fallen friend in his new neighbor, Abel Urueta, a once legendary director whose career was destroyed by the unfinished mess of his last film. Lifelong film buffs Montserrat and Tristán have remained best friends since childhood, though their lives take very different turns, with Montserrat going into the underpaid, male-dominated audio editing space and Tristán rising to and falling from soap opera stardom. but Montserrat soon notices a dark presence following her, and Tristán begins seeing the ghost of his ex-girlfriend.Īs they work together to unravel the mystery of the film and the obscure occultist who once roamed their city, Montserrat and Tristán may find that sorcerers and magic are not only the stuff of movies.Bestseller Moreno-Garcia ( The Daughter of Doctor Moreau) takes readers behind the scenes of 1993 Mexico City’s horror movie industry in this powerful and chilling thrill ride. Now the director wants Montserrat and Tristán to help him shoot the missing scene and lift the curse. The magic film was never finished, which is why, Urueta swears, his career vanished overnight. Then Tristán discovers his new neighbor is the cult horror director Abel Urueta, and the legendary auteur claims he can change their lives -even if his tale of a Nazi occultist imbuing magic into highly volatile silver nitrate stock sounds like sheer fantasy. And she's all but invisible to her best friend, Tristán, a charming if faded soap opera star, though she's been in love with him since childhood. She's a talented sound editor, but she's left out of the boys' club running the film industry in '90s Mexico City. From the New York Times bestselling author of The Daughter of Doctor Moreau and Mexican Gothic comes a fabulous meld of Mexican horror movies and Nazi occultism: a dark thriller about the curse that haunts a legendary lost film-and awakens one woman's hidden powers.

Silver nitrate by silvia moreno garcia