Overlooked but very talented sound editor Montserrat feels she’s all but invisible to her best friend, faded soap opera star Tristán, even though she’s been in love with him since childhood. Tristán learns his new neighbor is cult horror director Abel Urueta, a man who claims he change their lives. But Urueta’s claims of a Nazi occultist ingraining actual sorcery into silver nitrate stock sounds like the plot of a horror film.
Urueta’s film was never finished. The old director believes he is cursed, and that curse ended his career. Now, with Montserrat and Tristán’s assistance, Urueta can film the missing scene and lift the curse. Montserrat soon realizes a dark presence is following her every move, and Tristán starts seeing the ghost of his ex-girlfriend. Working together to untangle the mystery of the film, Montserrat and Tristán learn of the strange occultist who once roamed their city, and discover sorcery is not the just the stuff of fantasy.
Why we’re excited about this book:
Silvia Moreno-Garcia’s work is some of the best horror fiction in the past ten years. The author of Signal to Noise, Certain Dark Things, Velvet Was the Night, Prime Meridian, The Daughter of Doctor Moreau, and Mexican Gothic among others, her short fiction has been featured in such anthologies as Best American Mystery and Suspense, and she’s edited the anthologies She Walks in Shadows, Fungi (with Orrin Grey), and Fractured: Tales of the Canadian Post-Apocalypse. With her latest, Moreno-Garcia puts her own spin on the cursed film trope with Nazi occultists and Mexican horror movies, all set in 1990s Mexico City. Dana Schwartz (Anatomy: A Love Story) says: “Silver Nitrate is a popcorn thrill ride into the underbelly of 1990s Mexican horror movies and occultism. Moreno-Garcia crafts a world so rich with details and history that you won’t be able to look away. Beyond being a breakneck read, this book forces readers to reckon with the monsters that scare us, on screen and in the shadows.”, and Tim Powers (The Anubis Gates) says: “You don’t just read this book, you live in it—and it will charm you, intrigue you, and scare the daylights out of you.”
Releasing from Del Rey 18 July 2023, Silver Nitrate by Silvia Moreno-Garcia is available for pre-order now.
BOB PASTORELLA