Genre Fiction
![Silvia Moreno-Garcia - [object Object] author](https://res.cloudinary.com/readsomnia/image/upload/authors/a_B004H7M5PA.jpg)
Velvet Was the Night
GOOD MORNING AMERICA BUZZ PICK • From the New York Times bestselling author of Mexican Gothic comes a simmering historical noir about a daydreaming secretary, a lonesome enforcer, and the mystery of the missing woman they're both desperate to find.
ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR: The New York Times Book Review, NPR, The Washington Post, The Boston Globe, New York Public Library, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, BookPage, She Reads, Library Journal • "An adrenalized, darkly romantic journey."-The Washington Post
Mexico in the 1970s is a dangerous country, even for Maite, a secretary who spends her life seeking the romance found in cheap comic books and ignoring the activists protesting around the city. When her next-door neighbor, the beautiful art student Leonora, disappears under suspicious circumstances, Maite finds herself searching for the missing woman-and journeying deeper into Leonora's secret life of student radicals and dissidents.
Mexico in the 1970s is a politically fraught land, even for Elvis, a goon with a passion for rock 'n' roll who knows more about kidney-smashing than intrigue. When Elvis is assigned to find Leonora, he begins a blood-soaked search for the woman-and his soul.
Swirling in parallel trajectories, Maite and Elvis attempt to discover the truth behind Leonora's disappearance, encountering hitmen, government agents, and Russian spies. Because Mexico in the 1970s is a noir, where life is cheap and the price of truth is high.
ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR: The New York Times Book Review, NPR, The Washington Post, The Boston Globe, New York Public Library, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, BookPage, She Reads, Library Journal • "An adrenalized, darkly romantic journey."-The Washington Post
Mexico in the 1970s is a dangerous country, even for Maite, a secretary who spends her life seeking the romance found in cheap comic books and ignoring the activists protesting around the city. When her next-door neighbor, the beautiful art student Leonora, disappears under suspicious circumstances, Maite finds herself searching for the missing woman-and journeying deeper into Leonora's secret life of student radicals and dissidents.
Mexico in the 1970s is a politically fraught land, even for Elvis, a goon with a passion for rock 'n' roll who knows more about kidney-smashing than intrigue. When Elvis is assigned to find Leonora, he begins a blood-soaked search for the woman-and his soul.
Swirling in parallel trajectories, Maite and Elvis attempt to discover the truth behind Leonora's disappearance, encountering hitmen, government agents, and Russian spies. Because Mexico in the 1970s is a noir, where life is cheap and the price of truth is high.
Editorial Reviews
"[Velvet Was the Night] is a noir with a heart of gold, and it's a narrative in which the empathy we feel for its characters ultimately reveals an important truth: That Moreno-Garcia is not only a talented storyteller but also an incredibly versatile one."-NPR
"An absolute flex . . . [Velvet Was the Night] left me marveling at what kind of sorceress Moreno-Garcia must be as she reworks genre after genre, weaving in Mexican history and culture, satisfying familiar cravings without resorting to mere pastiche. The most tantalizing suspense of all comes with wondering what she'll do next."-Slate
"Moreno-Garcia proves her prowess as a historical fiction powerhouse again."-BuzzFeed
"Immensely satisfying, refreshingly new and gloriously written . . . Moreno-Garcia mashes up Anglocentric genres with midcentury Mexican history, resulting in a brew flavored with love, heartbreak, violence, music and unsettling dread. . . . The gift of this book, and Moreno-Garcia's storytelling, is how it imbues this well-worn genre with added strength, grace and even musicality."-The New York Times Book Review
"An enthralling tale that's as fun as it is mysterious . . . The characters are fascinating, the tone lush and romantic, and it's all wrapped up in a mystery with twists and turns one likely won't see coming. . . . [Moreno-Garcia is] the sort of author whose works automatically end up on your ‘must-read' list."-USA Today
"The author's previous novel, Mexican Gothic, turned the screw on the traditional ghost story; here she gleefully pries hard-boiled noir from the cold, white hands of Chandler and Hammett."-Oprah Daily
"A delicious, twisted treat for lovers of noir. Silvia Moreno-Garcia is a masterful writer who pulls you into her dark world and never lets you go. From the suspenseful, slow-burn plot to the crisp, desperate characters, you will be obsessed."-Simone St. James, New York Times bestselling aut...
"An absolute flex . . . [Velvet Was the Night] left me marveling at what kind of sorceress Moreno-Garcia must be as she reworks genre after genre, weaving in Mexican history and culture, satisfying familiar cravings without resorting to mere pastiche. The most tantalizing suspense of all comes with wondering what she'll do next."-Slate
"Moreno-Garcia proves her prowess as a historical fiction powerhouse again."-BuzzFeed
"Immensely satisfying, refreshingly new and gloriously written . . . Moreno-Garcia mashes up Anglocentric genres with midcentury Mexican history, resulting in a brew flavored with love, heartbreak, violence, music and unsettling dread. . . . The gift of this book, and Moreno-Garcia's storytelling, is how it imbues this well-worn genre with added strength, grace and even musicality."-The New York Times Book Review
"An enthralling tale that's as fun as it is mysterious . . . The characters are fascinating, the tone lush and romantic, and it's all wrapped up in a mystery with twists and turns one likely won't see coming. . . . [Moreno-Garcia is] the sort of author whose works automatically end up on your ‘must-read' list."-USA Today
"The author's previous novel, Mexican Gothic, turned the screw on the traditional ghost story; here she gleefully pries hard-boiled noir from the cold, white hands of Chandler and Hammett."-Oprah Daily
"A delicious, twisted treat for lovers of noir. Silvia Moreno-Garcia is a masterful writer who pulls you into her dark world and never lets you go. From the suspenseful, slow-burn plot to the crisp, desperate characters, you will be obsessed."-Simone St. James, New York Times bestselling aut...
Readers Top Reviews
LenIrving Teitelb
The author describes her book as noir pulp fiction based on a true events that happened in Mexico during student protests back in 1971. Her story focuses on two main characters. Maite is a bored secretary caught in a rut working at a law office hating her job but comfortable enough not to move on. Romance comics and American records provide her only respite from the boredom. Elvis is a member of the Hawks responsible for beating up students demonstrating against the corrupt government of President Luis Echeverría. Maite, of course, slowly gets drawn into the intrigue of which Elvis is a part. Shady characters provide the noir and the fun plot makes it fun. A very enjoyable read.
Sergio McInnesLen
She’s a great writer, with great imagination and engaging stories. Book arrived in good condition . Cheers
G. D. ThompsonSer
As soon as you read line one you are in the book. It's real, you care about the characters. Everything flows, so easily readable, just like every other book by this author. Highly recommended
Kathleen GeierG.
I liked Silvia Moreno-Garcia's first noir novel, Untamed Shore, very much and I absolutely adore this one. It features deeply believable characters who are also capable of surprising you, a powerful political subtext (Mexico's Dirty War), fascinating forays into pop culture (comic books, rock & roll), and stellar writing. Plus there's that gorgeous cover and a swell accompanying Spotify playlist. What a great, riveting summer read!
The Teachariel le
I'm about 30% into this book and I don't think I'll continue. For one thing, the characters are both unlikeable. El Elvis is a criminal but with a good heart? At least he thinks so. He can't afford to make a life selling records so he becomes a government-sponsored anti-communist enforcer. Maite is a whiner. And a thief. She steals from her friends, which is pretty unfriendly. And the story is almost all telling, no showing, which makes it even harder to sink into the story. I'd like to be swept up in 1970s Mexico, but it's not happening and I don't have the time or energy to fight for it. A pity it was so expensive.
Short Excerpt Teaser
1
June 10, 1971
He didn't like beating people.
El Elvis realized this was ironic considering his line of work. Imagine that: a thug who wanted to hold his punches. Then again, life is full of such ironies. Consider Ritchie Valens, who was afraid of flying and died the first time he set foot on an airplane. Damn shame that, and the other dudes who died, Buddy Holly and "The Big Bopper" Richardson; they weren't half bad either. Or there was that playwright Aeschylus. He was afraid of being killed inside his house, and then he steps outside and wham, an eagle tosses a tortoise at him, cracking his head open. Murdered, right there in the most stupid way possible.
Often life doesn't make sense, and if Elvis had a motto it was that: life's a mess. That's probably why he loved music and factoids. They helped him construct a more organized world. When he wasn't listening to his records, he was poring over the dictionary, trying to memorize a new word, or plowing through one of those almanacs full of stats.
No, sir. Elvis wasn't like some of the perverts he worked with, who got excited smashing a dude's kidneys. He would have been happy solving crosswords and sipping coffee like their boss, El Mago, and maybe one day he would be an accomplished man of that sort, but for now there was work to be done, and this time Elvis was actually eager to beat a few motherf***ers up.
He hadn't developed a sudden taste for blood and cracking bones, no, but El Güero had been at him again.
El Güero was a policeman before he joined up with Elvis's group, and that made him cocky, made him want to throw his weight around. In practice being a poli meant shit because El Mago was the egalitarian sort who didn't care where his recruits came from-ex-cops, ex-military, porros, and juvenile delinquents were welcome as long as they worked right. But the thing was El Güero was twenty-five, getting long in the tooth, and that was making him anxious. Soon enough he'd have to move on.
The chief requirement of a Hawk was he needed to look like a student so he could inform on the activities of the annoying reds infesting the universities-Trotskos, Maoists, Espartacos; there were so many flavors of dissidents Elvis could barely keep track of all their organizations-and also, if necessary, f*** up a few of them. Sure, there were important fossils, like El Fish, who was twentyseven. But El Fish had been in one political shenanigan or another since he was a wee first-year chemistry student; he was as professional as porros got. El Güero hadn't achieved nearly as much. Elvis had just turned twenty-one, and El Güero felt the weight of his age and eyed the younger man with distrust, suspecting El Mago was going to pick El Elvis for a plum position.
Lately El Güero had been making snide remarks about how Elvis was a marshmallow, how he never went on any of the heavy assignments and instead he was picking locks and taking pictures. Elvis did what El Mago asked, and if El Mago wanted him to pick the locks and snap photos, who was Elvis to protest? But that didn't sway El Güero, who had taken to impugning Elvis's masculinity in veiled and irritating ways.
"A man who spends so much time running a comb through his hair isn't a man at all," El Güero would say. "The real Elvis Presley is a hip-shaking girlie-man."
"What you getting at?" Elvis asked, and El Güero smiled. "What you saying 'bout me now?"
"Didn't mean you, of course."
"Who'd you mean, then?"
"Presley, like I said. The f***ing weirdo you like so much."
"Presley's the king. Ain't nothin' wrong in liking him."
"Yankee garbage," El Güero said smugly.
And then, when it wasn't that, El Güero decided to use an assortment of nicknames to refer to Elvis, none of which were his code name. He had a fondness for calling him La Cucaracha, but also Tribilín, on account of his teeth.
In short, Elvis was in dire need of asserting himself, of showing his teammates that he wasn't no f***ing marshmallow. He wanted to get dirty, to put all those fighting techniques El Mago made them learn to good use, to show he was as capable as any of the other guys, especially as capable as El Güero, who looked like a f***ing extra in a Nazi movie, and Elvis had no doubts that his dear papa had been saying "heil" real merrily until he boarded a boat and moved his stupid family to Mexico. Yeah, El Güero looked like a Nazi and n...
June 10, 1971
He didn't like beating people.
El Elvis realized this was ironic considering his line of work. Imagine that: a thug who wanted to hold his punches. Then again, life is full of such ironies. Consider Ritchie Valens, who was afraid of flying and died the first time he set foot on an airplane. Damn shame that, and the other dudes who died, Buddy Holly and "The Big Bopper" Richardson; they weren't half bad either. Or there was that playwright Aeschylus. He was afraid of being killed inside his house, and then he steps outside and wham, an eagle tosses a tortoise at him, cracking his head open. Murdered, right there in the most stupid way possible.
Often life doesn't make sense, and if Elvis had a motto it was that: life's a mess. That's probably why he loved music and factoids. They helped him construct a more organized world. When he wasn't listening to his records, he was poring over the dictionary, trying to memorize a new word, or plowing through one of those almanacs full of stats.
No, sir. Elvis wasn't like some of the perverts he worked with, who got excited smashing a dude's kidneys. He would have been happy solving crosswords and sipping coffee like their boss, El Mago, and maybe one day he would be an accomplished man of that sort, but for now there was work to be done, and this time Elvis was actually eager to beat a few motherf***ers up.
He hadn't developed a sudden taste for blood and cracking bones, no, but El Güero had been at him again.
El Güero was a policeman before he joined up with Elvis's group, and that made him cocky, made him want to throw his weight around. In practice being a poli meant shit because El Mago was the egalitarian sort who didn't care where his recruits came from-ex-cops, ex-military, porros, and juvenile delinquents were welcome as long as they worked right. But the thing was El Güero was twenty-five, getting long in the tooth, and that was making him anxious. Soon enough he'd have to move on.
The chief requirement of a Hawk was he needed to look like a student so he could inform on the activities of the annoying reds infesting the universities-Trotskos, Maoists, Espartacos; there were so many flavors of dissidents Elvis could barely keep track of all their organizations-and also, if necessary, f*** up a few of them. Sure, there were important fossils, like El Fish, who was twentyseven. But El Fish had been in one political shenanigan or another since he was a wee first-year chemistry student; he was as professional as porros got. El Güero hadn't achieved nearly as much. Elvis had just turned twenty-one, and El Güero felt the weight of his age and eyed the younger man with distrust, suspecting El Mago was going to pick El Elvis for a plum position.
Lately El Güero had been making snide remarks about how Elvis was a marshmallow, how he never went on any of the heavy assignments and instead he was picking locks and taking pictures. Elvis did what El Mago asked, and if El Mago wanted him to pick the locks and snap photos, who was Elvis to protest? But that didn't sway El Güero, who had taken to impugning Elvis's masculinity in veiled and irritating ways.
"A man who spends so much time running a comb through his hair isn't a man at all," El Güero would say. "The real Elvis Presley is a hip-shaking girlie-man."
"What you getting at?" Elvis asked, and El Güero smiled. "What you saying 'bout me now?"
"Didn't mean you, of course."
"Who'd you mean, then?"
"Presley, like I said. The f***ing weirdo you like so much."
"Presley's the king. Ain't nothin' wrong in liking him."
"Yankee garbage," El Güero said smugly.
And then, when it wasn't that, El Güero decided to use an assortment of nicknames to refer to Elvis, none of which were his code name. He had a fondness for calling him La Cucaracha, but also Tribilín, on account of his teeth.
In short, Elvis was in dire need of asserting himself, of showing his teammates that he wasn't no f***ing marshmallow. He wanted to get dirty, to put all those fighting techniques El Mago made them learn to good use, to show he was as capable as any of the other guys, especially as capable as El Güero, who looked like a f***ing extra in a Nazi movie, and Elvis had no doubts that his dear papa had been saying "heil" real merrily until he boarded a boat and moved his stupid family to Mexico. Yeah, El Güero looked like a Nazi and n...
