the daughter of doctor moreau silvia moreno garcia

But like the best historical fiction, this novel also speaks to the heart of what contemporary readers turn to literature for, as it draws out the colonial and racial implications of Moreau's 'research,' enlarging Wells' own moral message. If you're a they-don't-make-'em-like-they-used-to type of reader who longs for the romance and high drama of big 19th-century novels, 'The Daughter of Doctor Moreau' is a flawless replica. Despite the fact that Yaxaktun is located near rebel territory in the Caste War, they have settled into a peaceful existence - until Hernando Lizalde's son shows up looking for an 'Indian raiding party' he thinks has passed by Yaxaktun and finds instead the beautiful Carlota and the mysterious Doctor Moreau.

The bulk of the action takes place six years after Montgomery's arrival. Moreno-Garcia alternates chapters between the points of view of Carlota and the mayordomo, Montgomery, who is running from his own demons in the form of a heartbreak back in England, and who is happy to drown his sorrows in alcohol. The only other family he has to help is a brother in France that he hardly speaks to, and his teen daughter, Carlota, who has no one but her distracted father and the hybrids for company.

Moreau tells Lizalde the hybrids are being created to become workers and he needs a mayordomo to take care of day-to-day operations. He has been financed by his patron, Hernando Lizalde, to refine his hybrid research and creation. This puts the political ramifications of the hybrids' otherness into even sharper relief.Īt the novel's start, Moreau is looking for a new mayordomo to manage his property, Yaxaktun. Moreno-Garcia imagines that this island is actually the Yucatan peninsula, allowing the book to use a real historical conflict, The Yucatan Caste War, as a backdrop. Wells' 1896 mad-scientist story 'The Island of Doctor Moreau,' 'The Daughter of Doctor Moreau' makes a number of ingenious adaptations to Wells' tale about a scientist on an island who practices vivisection to create human-animal hybrids. Now, Moreno-Garcia's enthralling new novel, 'The Daughter of Doctor Moreau,' deftly blends 19th-century science fiction with a 21st-century sensibility.ĭrawing inspiration from H.G. Her previous work skips genres and times with similar fluidity.

Is there a contemporary writer more chameleonic than Silvia Moreno-Garcia? Her breakout novel, the New York Times-bestselling 'Mexican Gothic,' is a gothic horror tale set in 1950s Mexico last year's 'Velvet Was the Night,' is a 1970s noir.

The daughter of doctor moreau silvia moreno garcia