The Bewitching by Silvia Moreno-Garcia
My thoughts on her July 2025 release!
Three women in three different eras encounter danger and witchcraft in this eerie multigenerational horror saga from the New York Times bestselling author of Mexican Gothic.
If you know me from Bookstagram or Goodreads—as I think is the case with most of you who follow me at this point?—then you might recall that Silvia Moreno-Garcia is one of my favorite authors, so I was obviously thrilled when Del Rey reached out via NetGalley with an advance copy of her 2025 release!
Overall, I loved it—this might even be my favorite book of hers now?—and suspect that fans of Mexican Gothic and/or The Daughter of Doctor Moreau will as well. The vibes were also very reminiscent of Isabel Cañas’ The Hacienda and Vampires of El Norte. Lovers of dark academia and witchcraft will certainly be into this.
The Bewitching follows three women across different generations whose lives become entangled in the same witchcraft:
1908: Alba, a young woman mourning the recent death of her father while trying to save their family’s struggling farm in Mexico. Her uncle arrives from Mexico City to help, while in the surrounding hills there are whispers that their land may be cursed by witches.
1934: Beatrice, a college student who watches her best friend descend into suspected madness before she mysteriously disappears one day. Later, Beatrice writes a book inspired by the events.
1998: Minerva, Alba’s great-granddaughter who now studies literature at the same university and is attempting to research Beatrice and her book for her thesis.
Since The Bewitching isn’t out for several more months, there’s not too much I feel like I can say about the specifics of the plot, but I loved the triple timeline going on. I enjoy both historical and contemporary settings, so this felt like I got the best of both worlds. I love how versatile SMG’s writing style is—there aren’t that many contemporary authors that I know of who can so effortlessly slip into several time periods at once! Her writing is so atmospheric (I always feel like I’ve visited Mexico after reading one of her books!) and really transports you to each of the different settings. This book kept me gripped the entire time.
Really my only gripe with it was that there was an incest subplot that didn’t feel wholly necessary. To be clear: this is not a book about incest, and the whole situation was supposed to be repulsive. I think she put it there precisely because it is so repulsive and she needed us to feel like a particular character involved is the epitome of evil. But I just wonder if there might have been another way about it, since there are some scenes toward the end that I think could be really difficult to read for anyone who has ever experienced SA from a family member. It obviously didn’t ruin the book for me based on this review, but I felt like I should include that potential trigger warning in my review!
If you’ve read any of Silvia Moreno-Garcia’s other work and enjoyed it, you’ll probably enjoy The Bewitching as it feels very much like her classic style. Likewise, if you read one of her books and hated it, I don’t know that this one would manage to sway you in the other direction.
As for me, I’m a big fan of her work and The Bewitching was no exception. I’m thrilled that this was my last read of 2024!