Juan Martinez (1) (1974–)

I don't read a lot of cosmic horror - I do not get scared by it and most of the books in the genre rely on the scare factor. Once you remove that, they tend to be bland or worse. But once in awhile a book catches my eye - and that's what happened when I saw this one in the library.

The bulk of the story is familiar - someone goes to a hotel and the hotel ends up being more than it should be. There are echos of earlier books - both from the Lovecraftian tradition and from the straight horror one (creepy young girls in hotels for example). You (almost) cannot write in the genre without some of it. And as usual, it is the backstory that makes the book different.

Alvaro (not his name but he uses that name for most of the book so we probably shall call him that) used to be a student in a university in Columbia. He dropped off twice and just when he started figuring out what he is going to do with his life, the family is abducted, tortured and killed while on the road. He survives, so does one of his sisters that missed the trip. But somewhere in these woods, a lurking evil is awaken and Alvaro runs to USA, ultimately ending in Las Vegas. Where the hotel, Alicia, is waiting for him.

Martinez weaves the supernatural horror with the human-made one - immigrants with false papers, ICE and the invisibility of the unwanted and underpaid sometimes make up the more horrific part of the story. The final twists are perfect - the book built up to them and even if I did not see them coming (I probably should have), they work perfectly with the story.

The book is extremely gory - the torture of the family at the start is very graphic and once the story slips squarely into the cosmic horror territory, things get outright gory.

The book is part of University of Arizona Press's Camino del Sol series - a A Latinx literature series that publishes in all genres and forms (fiction, non-fiction, poetry, drama). I think I will check a few more of their books but probably in an e-book format - the publisher chose to print this with an extremely small font (think the font usually used for copyright pages for example, a point or 2 smaller than any other book I have out from the library, including a few older mass market paperbacks) and that was tiring even on my eyes (or I am getting older).… (more)

I am beginning to think that this century may be the best in long time for short stories. Juan Martinez is a Colombian living in Orlando and this selection of short stories covers South American life and life in the US with the eye of an ex-pat. HIs distance from both give us as readers an unusual and perhaps unique insight into both worlds. His prose is tight but not terse and he covers the bases well ranging from very short observational pieces to longer more thoughtful stories of lives we rarely see or even hear of. One or two of these short stories are very good indeed and I look forward to hearing more from him.… (more)