The Route of Ice and Salt was originally published in 1990s Mexico and is being translated into English for the first time in 2021. It is a story of Dracula's journey to England, narrated by the ship's captain who, even though he starts the journey unaware of the presence on his ship is, unfortunately, all too aware of the nature of vampires, and of creatures of appetites that are outside the norm.

This is a book about monsters. This is also a book about gay desire. I am fighting against my own instincts at the moment that tell me to quote Jeffrey Jerome Cohen's essay "Monster Culture: Seven Theses" in lieu of continuing this review, the way JLZ quotes Bram Stoker's own logs from the Demeter in the middle of the book.
It was a dense and tension filled novella that made me want to get out of bed, turn all the lights on, and attempt to write a paper or ten about it. The way José Luis Zárate weaves together the different visions of the vampire from across and around southeastern Europe to reflect and respond to the Captain's own internalised guilt and shame is exquisite, and difficult to read at times but all the more rewarding for it when you reach the ending.

Reader I loved it.

Thank you to NetGalley and Innsmouth Free Press for the copy of The Route of Ice and Salt.

A queer novella retelling of Dracula aboard the Demeter, this was packed with gothic atmosphere, sensuality, and a haunting symphony of rats. The author included the original logs from Dracula and places them throughout the novella, so if you haven’t read Dracula you can still read this. This is the type of story that could be deeply analyzed, as there isn’t necessarily much plot, but instead a journey through internalized and externalized homophobia, queerness at this point in history, and the Captain of the ship coming to terms with his past and sexual desire.

While I found some parts difficult to get through, the detailed complexities of the Captain and unfortunately, the rats, led me to become engrossed. If you aren’t a fan of rats this might not be for you! Overall this was an interesting take on a piece of Dracula. It was originally published in the 1990’s in Spanish, and this is a translation. There is a fantastic foreword from Silvia Moreno-Garcia, a prologue from the author, and a great afterward from Poppy Z. Brite that describe the phenomenon around this novella.

CW: Internalized and externalized homophobia, body horror, some gore, rat things, sexual themes and detail

I heard of this book from Silvia Moreno-Garcia who published it in English for the first time this year. She talked about it on Twitter and mentioned it was available on Netgalley. Since I really enjoyed her novels Mexican Gothic and Gods of Jade and Shadow, I trusted her recommendation.

I have never read Dracula, but I don't think that is a deal breaker for reading this novella. This actually made me interested in reading Dracula for the first time.

The writing is very poetic and well done to set the story in the 1800s. Going into it knowing it is a cult novella with a gay protagonist should sort of prepare you for the blunt queer desire jumping from the pages. The captain has his own backstory that slowly comes out during the book. It's very much about how he deals with his oppressed homosexuality and realizes that being gay is not the same as being a monster (something he'd grown up believing and blaming himself for). The book is very dark and the descriptions of the rats and the ghouls aboard the ship were intense and made me claustrophobic. A very quick and also thought-provoking read.

This was a strange novella about the captain of the ship that brought Count Dracula to England. And while there's a strong gothic current throughout the story, there is a greater emphasis on the homoerotic theme. The captain is haunted by his homosexual yearnings, and the vampiric overtones draw some interesting parallels between his internal plight and the bloodthirsty goings-on.

It's almost impossible to translate a book from one language to another without losing some of the flavor of the original. And while I can't compare the English version to the original Spanish version, I do think the translation does a serviceable job. The language is poetic and full of dark imagery that evokes the captain's desperation.

I also appreciate the short length of this book. A longer novel would have become tiresome, so the short form works well for the story. I recommend this book to vampire fiction fans and to literary aficionados alike.

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for providing me with an ARC in exchange for my honest opinions.

I’ve been stuck on how to review this book for a while now because it’s a difficult one, really. To review it at all properly requires splitting it into the book and the translation (although not having read the original text makes that...hard to say the least). So, this is a review for why you should pick the book up in general, regardless of which language you’re reading it in (and why English-speaking readers should be very happy they can finally read it too).

The Route of Ice and Salt fills in the gap between Dracula’s departure from mainland Europe and his arrival on the shores of England, following the captain of the Demeter as he gradually comes to realise not all is as it seems aboard his ship.

As the introduction notes, vampirism is often taken as an allegory for gayness, and this novella interweaves the two explicitly and incredibly well. The Captain’s former lover is killed in a manner that would befit a vampire; he often thinks of his desire as somehow parasitic. But it also pulls apart the allegory, dissects the comparison and throws it away. The Captain comes to realise there is nothing wrong with his being gay, but there is something wrong with a creature which feeds off the living, as it has done its crew.

In addition to this — and I think this is a point about the translation as well as the original work — the writing is intoxicating and tense. It pulls you in in the first part, with the Captain’s fight against his own desires, hooks you then, and proceeds to slowly and steadily intensify as each crew member disappears mysteriously on the voyage. You go through the book almost as in the dark as to what’s coming as the characters themselves (I say almost because you are at least aware of Dracula’s presence). Granted, some of this may have been that I haven’t actually read Dracula, but in terms of building the tension, the point stands.

So, even if you haven’t read (or don’t care to read) Dracula, this novella should definitely be on your radar (and also, not having read the other is no barrier to reading this).

Originally published in Spanish and now translated to English, The Route of Ice and Salt is an iconic novel by Mexican Author José Luis Zárate. We all know about Bram Stoker’s Dracula and the mystery behind the Demeter—the unfortunate ship that, unknowingly, brought Dracula to London. In The Route of Ice and Salt, Zárate brings us back to the Demeter to narrate what happened to its crew and captain. For the Captain, it was supposed to be just another job, but he’ll soon learn real evil lurks in the strange cargo, and it’s up to him to save his sailors’ souls from eternal damnation.

Written in a gothic style, this novel does an outstanding job to bring us back into the horror-filled pages of Dracula. The atmosphere was well set. Carefully crafted sentences and detailed descriptions, pave a smooth road from the Captain’s musings about his queer desires to the rising tension as the story progresses into its horror elements. I find the transition was well done, especially how Dracula’s lurk about the ship mirrored the Captain’s character development as a repressed homosexual. His predatory thoughts about his crew were used as a juxtaposition for the vampire stalking the night.

This journey is marked by metaphors about the relationship between body fluids (blood, sweat, semen) and the mystery of the seawater. These metaphors, joined by how the Captain’s past traumas were revealed at a tantalizing pace while at the same time the monster slowly stalked the Demeter’s crew members, make for a seamless experience of psychological horror.

As much as I liked this book I have to be honest and say the first half dragged too much for me. I understand it was supposed to set the stage for who the Captain is as a character and the extent of his internalized homophobia, but there were too many wet dreams and lascivious thoughts about the men working under him to drive a point that was already well-driven. It felt somewhat repetitive. However, this is easy to forgive since this is a short novella and it doesn’t take much time. I have to admit the cathartic moment of the Captain as he accepts himself is made a lot better precisely because we already knew him so well.

I must mention the creepy vibes of the story are well established from the start. Even if that first half is just the Captain repressing his feelings, there’s a lot of scary imagery and darkness in those sentences. The way the vampire slowly takes over the story, the rats, the caskets, the sailors’ instinct about how something is wrong but refuse to talk about it, all of this makes for a great horror novella.

I highly recommend this book to anyone who’s ever read Dracula and enjoyed it. Now, with this new translation, I think it would be a good idea for literature curses to explore this novella alongside Dracula—it’s a great example of gothic literature at its best.

Disclaimer: I received an ARC (Advanced Reader's Copy) from the publisher via Netgalley and decided to leave an honest review.

I wasn’t really sure what to think of this one, but in the end give it a thumbs up. If you like the Dracula myth, then this is definitely worth checking out.
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First, the premise: it’s the story of the captain of The Demeter, the ship that brought Dracula from the Black Sea to England in Bram Stoker’s Dracula.
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Next, the weirdness: there is a lot of weird dream sex. It also dives right in to the captain thinking lascivious thoughts about his crewmembers, and how he likes them to be clothed so he won’t be tempted (because he would never act on it).
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I wasn’t exactly sure what to make of the beginning, which felt a little like the author was going all-in on what readers in Mexico at the time might expect from a gay man (see above re weird sex dreams etc). I am happy to say that by the end of the book, the captain has come to terms with his feelings and his past and has let go of his guilt. All in all it’s not a self-hating-queer story, but I did get those kinds of vibes at the beginning.
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Next, the amazing part: the writing is just lovely and so atmospheric. David Bowles did a great job translating…or at least, the translated work is very, very well written.
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The creepy: the caskets of earth, and how the vampire is slowly suspected/revealed, is creepy af. Shivers. Really well done. So yeah, if you like Dracula stories, or groundbreaking-if-weird queer fantasy, this is a good addition to the collection.
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Additional content warnings: racism early on with an offhand comment of wanting a sex worker to be as white as possible. Mention of child sex slavery. Suicide. Mob murder of a gay man (in the past but described). Dubious consent (in the past) which is addressed as wrong.
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I supported the translation of this by donating to a project started by #SilviaMorenoGarcia, and got an ARC in exchange for an honest review. TL;DR I also requested from #Netgalley. Pub date January 19, 2021, so get your pre-orders in!

This is amazing!
I was expecting something a little different going in, but I was pleasantly surprised.

This book has elements of a gothic horror and was very compelling.
I am in awe of whoever translated this book because they have done an exceptional job on it.
I couldn't even tell that it had been initially written in a different language.

This book follows a sea captain and his repressed sexuality and shows us his inner most thoughts.

This was a unique read for sure and I quite liked it.

***Special thanks to Innsmouth Free Press and NetGalley for providing me with a free copy in exchange for an honest review***

This is a book that I think I will get more out of as I get older. It is a BEAUTIFULLY translated novel about a sea-captain and his repressed homosexual desires with a backdrop of gothic elements and one of the most famous "monsters" of all time; Dracula.

It was hard for me to read some of the captain's innermost thoughts. A lot of his desires struck me as borderline predatory and made me feel uncomfortable, but it is important to understand that he is a deeply repressed man in a society that is cruel and oftentimes violent towards anyone who is even assumed to be a homosexual.

This is a book that I would like to re-read in the future, especially at a different point in my life. This book is very beautiful, but I feel like one needs to work with it in order to get its full message across.

This book was just brilliant! I love horror, but I love it even more when the story is disturbing and this is just that. I loved how the main character was grappling to terms with his sexuality. I loved how it dealt with internalized homophobia as some kind of "horror" as well as the contrast to the actual horror.

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Hello! My full review has been posted on Goodreads. You can read my review through this link: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/3609834160?book_show_action=false

For the first time in English, The Route of Ice & Salt presents the story of Dracula through the eyes of a minor character in the original story: the captain of the ship that brought him to England.

While originally published in 1998, the novella is still told in a very classic style for a nautical story. Our story begins with the captain of the Demeter as he takes on crates of earth for his newest shipment. The job is fairly straightforward, if dull for our protagonist, and for the first part of the novella, the lack of urgency is felt in how he indulges in sexual fantasies. He never performs them with others, but nevertheless lets his mind wander. That is until signs begin to erupt that something is not right on the Demeter, and my favourite trope in nautical stories appears at the beginning of part 2: the tone shift from sensual enjoyment to serious terror. It’s like a bucket of ice drops on you and you are hooked into the story even more because of it.

The desperation and terror are palpable in the pages and I believe any one who enjoys classic or cult horror will devour The Route of Ice & Salt.

Of final note, I believe the Introduction and Afterward from Silivia Moreno-Garcia and Poppy Z Brite, respectively, are crucial to how readers will interpret the novella. I can see many readers being turned off by the creeping sensuality of the first part and not appreciating this novella for what it is: a new point of view from an older voice long left unheard in english-speaking publishing. However, the Introduction and Afterward act as amazing guides and hopefully more readers will appreciate José Luis Zárate (and David Bowles efforts in translating Zárate’s story). I most certainly did.

Content Warnings: Homophobia, Internalized Homophobia, Sexual Horror, and Mutilation.

I received an e-ARC via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

Artist inspires Artist and media inspires media. The Route of Ice and Salt ( La ruta del hielo y la sal) was originally published in 1998 by a Mexican comic publisher Grupo Editorial VID, it didn't take root and but it became cult classic. It's now in English for the first time through Silvia Moreno-Garcia's efforts.

This novella reimagines Dracula’s voyage to England on The Demeter. The Route of Ice and Salt gives the nameless Captain a voice as gay man in this time period. This book is really about hunger, the captain 's hunger for love and physical touch, his sexual fantasies regarding his crewmen and Dracula's hunger where each crewmember is attacked one after an other. The captain realizes that he has a feeling besides hunger for his men, love and he will fight for them. This novella is about the captain 's emotional trauma he experienced as a young man, his internalized homophobia and accepting himself. . Zárate does this by writing poetically , i had to re read sentences more than once because they were beautiful but also because i had to keep track if the captain remembered a memory or if was present time. It felt like a fever dream at times, a beautiful one but still fever dream. The Route of Ice and Salt is horror, poetry and philosophical. The latine SFF community knows of it's existence and I'm happy English readership can experience this emotional weird queer gothic story

This is the first English translation of this novella that was originally published in Mexico in 1998. This novella is unique in several ways for science fiction produced in Mexico at that time, its focus is on Dracula and it is a queer novella. The story follows the voyage of the Demeter in 1897 as is travels from Varna to Whitby, England. In Varna, it has loaded cargo in the form of heavy wooden crates apparently filled with soil. The voyage begins smoothly enough but strange things begin to happen as crew members begin to disappear. The story is told from point of view of the Captain and weaves memories of his experiences as a young man with Mikhail in with what is happening aboard the ship. The story is both an intimate look at the life of a man who cannot be who he wants to be, while facing unnatural events that force him to face up to a terrible incident in his past. There are multiple layers to the story and the beautiful prose makes this a fascinating read.

Thank you to NetGalley and Innsmouth Free Press for giving me an ebook copy to review. All opinions stated are my own.

TW: Homophobia, internalised homophobia, graphic descriptions of gore moments (I don't think it is traditional gore though), sexual repression.

Where do I even begin?

As someone whose familiarity with vampires starts and ends with Twilight saga and pop-culture references, I wasn't too sure how I would understand this book from a horror perspective. I am also kind of weary of translated books, because personally, they may read as very flat most of the time.

However, I was eager to dive into this story purely because I am not familiar with how LGBTQIA+ works look like around the world as was interested to find out. Also from my understanding, "The Route of Ice and Salt" is a cult classic and I definitely understand why.

The majority of this book takes place on a ship, The Demeter, whose gay captain is tasked with bringing Dracula to England. There is a ton of repressed sexual dreams and fantasies in the first half of this book while disturbing at times, it genuinely helps with breaking the dense story-telling told.

The second half is far more interesting and it there that this story shines. We see a more traditional horror. It was definitely this section that sold the book for me. We see a captain and crew, who are terrified of the unknown but have no way of tangibly over a fear that doesn't seem to exist.

themes of love, loyalty and sacrifice mingle wonderfully well within the horror of this tale, especially because the novella jumps frequently between dreams, fantasies. the past and present.

I cannot emphasise how much I enjoyed the last two parts of this novella. David Bowles translations really shined during the ship logs and shorter chapters.

My highlights were the prologue, which definitely helped set the scene and author intentions for this piece. While the accompanying essay at the end by Poppy Z. Bright helped in tying together the thoughts for this novella.

This is not a campy read and I loved that.

I find novellas hard to review but in short: this is a disturbing and compelling story about the captain of the ship that unknowingly brings Count Dracula to England. Plagued by how he feels about his sexuality, his men and his past as well as a far more tangible threat on board, what ensues is a very unsettling story that not only examines the homoeroticism within the vampire genre but also tells a spooky story that pleasantly veers more towards ghostly than vampiric.

It took a bit for this to really grab me because the beginning is so wordy; I couldn’t tell whether this was a translation issue or in the original text but the language felt less like it was trying to be fitting for an 1800s setting and more like it was trying to sound flowery and meaningful. It isn’t as overwhelming once you get past 40%. The Captain is haunted by his previous lover’s murder as well as a desire for the men working below him and these desires are presented in the text as warped, monstrous and incredibly disturbing. I thought the presentation of how the Captain comes to view his sexuality versus Dracula’s true monstrosity was the most powerful aspect of the book.

The ending is superb and really unsettling once again in terms of imagery. The description of vampires in this is more ghostly and monstrous than most people I think are used to and it was a refreshing, unique take on them that I enjoyed. The climax of the book not only pulls off a final scary confrontation, but also cements a more academic approach to how vampires in literature have presented ideas about homosexuality for decades and the Captain’s realisations that his love is not corruption was very moving.

The language was unexpectedly poetic and a bit dry (that maybe due to it being a translated works). I don't know why but when I heard it was journey of the Demeter in Dracula but with a gay captain I thaught it would be more campy horror less poignant literary work about sexuality and use of vampirism as a literary metaphor for homosexuality. It was incredibly erotic, which I was oddly unprepared for.
The writing is a bit meandering and the style is similar to a stream of consciousness (being in the form of a personal diary). I found it confusing and difficult to follow at times, often getting lost in the narrator's tangets.
The captain's perpetual sexual fantasies in the first half of the novella got a bit repetitive. While I understand the purpose of including them it went on and on. His sexual dreams were bizarre and confusing and a bit gross (like when he had sex with a fleshy version of the ship). Not necessarily a bad thing, just not for me.
The captain's struggles with his sexuality and fears about it being revealed and finally coming to avvept that his feelings dont make him a monster and aren't inherently sinful was moving to read.
The actual horror elements like the sailors showing signs of being attacked by vampire, and them dying one by one I found very compelling and suspenseful. In the latter half of the story where the horror came more into focus was far more enjoyable to read.
Personally the best parts were the essays about Zarate and the influence of the novella, vampirism in fiction and as a metaphor of homosexuality. The inclusion of the various authors analysis gave real insights into the novella, the themes and inspiration behind it.

A stunning retelling that is both poetic and heartbreaking. Juxtaposing internal and external fears of otherness with vampire lore makes for a story unlike any other. It builds well on existing lore while also working perfectly well on its own. This is the sort of story that you’ll want to reread to catch every detail again. I’m in love with it.