This review was published in the Charleston Gazette-Mail on Saturday-Sunday, September 21-22, 2024.

A SUNNY PLACE FOR SHADY PEOPLE - Mariana Enriquez, September 17, 2024, Random House/Hogarth, 179 pages, translated by Megan McDowell.

Maria Enriquez is one of the bright lights of Latin American literature; she has had one novel and two short-story collections translated to English (including THE DANGERS OF SMOKING IN BED) and was a finalist for the Booker Prize. Here, her twelve transcendent short stories-which lie on the lines where the differences between good and evil are blurry-are set in her native Buenos Aires, Argentina, and all are haunted by the legacy of dictatorship there, some more obviously than the others.

One of my favorite stories in the collection, in which the influence is explicit, is “Hyena Hymns.” In it, the narrator is visiting his visiting his boyfriend, Mateo’s prosperous family. While having tea, the parents begin telling of a nearby zoo that was set on fire. The hyenas that are now in the area are thought to have escaped the flames.

The next day Mateo suggests they visit the Aguirre palace. The narrator objects, “I hate concentration camp tourism.”

Mateo replies, “Yes, they know the basement was used for torture. But the place was used for lots of other things, too. A summer house for rich people who, by the way, made all the cheese you armed last night, so you’ve already got Evil in you.”

So they go. Mistake. Big mistake.

In the title story, the narrator is from Buenos Aires but is based in New York City, writing for a magazine. Her magazine is starting a new section called “America in Weird” about strange events that involve the supernatural. She has been writing about Latin American politics, but she desperately wants to move to the new section.

So, she pitches a human-interest story to her editor: Elisa Lam, who in 2013 stays at the Cecil Hotel in Los Angeles, disappeared on January 31. The last sight of her was on surveillance footage in the hotel elevator. A few weeks later, guests at the hotel began to notice that the water coming from their taps had an odd color and a foul odor. On February 29, Elisa Lam’s decomposing body was found in the hotel’s water tank. How she got there is a mystery that has yet to be solved (this is a true story, by the way.)

The strangeness does not end, however. Now groups of people gather around the water tank because they believe Elisa’s spirit is trapped there. The people are waiting for a sign.

As the narrator flies from N.Y.C. to L.A. to cover the story, she thinks, “that gringos for you: they’ll worship a dead girl in this sinister hotel surrounded by addicts in various shades of intoxication, madness and crisis, but propriety will keep them from patting down a middle-aged Latina between her legs.”

She gets to L.A. She sneaks into the Cecil Hotel after hours and smuggles a cell phone in. And what she sees is surprising.

It’s worth noting that in the story, there is also a mountain lion running about the city. It is hardly ever seen. So, in both stories there are scary animals existing outside their natural habitats.

Both these stories, and the ten others included in their slim volume, are unsettling, but only in the best, shivery sort of way. Enriquez is a master at this and, separate from genre, her writing is pure and lyrical; she’s a worthy example of some of the best writing coming from Latin America today.

Another book that is a struggle to assess because the quality of the writing and whether the book is actually good are very, very far apart.

Enriquez has consistently been a better writer than storyteller, but this book is where the content really took a dramatic turn in that regard. Her writing is beautiful, there’s no doubt of that, but the content here just feels really flat, uninspired, and repetitive.

I greatly preferred her first story collection The Dangers of Smoking in Bed, though this one was at least mercifully less gross.

Sometimes you just don’t vibe with a book, and that’s okay.

I haven’t had the pleasure of reading Enriquez’s work before (Our Share of Night is still on my wishlist), but I thought reading this anthology would be a good place to dip my toe into the pool of her work.

Don’t get me wrong: It’s not that her writing is bad or that I didn’t like some of the stories. I just don’t think I appreciated her writing in a short story context. For some reason, I kept feeling like I wasn’t getting all of what Mariana Enriquez had to offer. I felt like her words, sentences, and thoughts were just too big for these small stories. It made most of the stories feel like small disappointments, or just small confusions (that’s not a word but I’m making it one for this review).

In the end, I was just left frustrated and the anthology, as a whole, just didn’t vibe with me.

I was provided a copy of this title by the publisher and the author via Netgalley. All thoughts, opinions, views, and ideas expressed herein are mine and mine alone. All reviews rated three stars or lower will not appear on my social media. Thank you.

File Under: Anthology/Horror/Literary Fiction/Translation

Normally, I have a fairly easy time breezing through short story collections, and I truly enjoy them! But with A Sunny Place for Shady People, I found myself more interested in the concepts than in the execution. I think the first story is definitely the strongest, and a favourite of mine across the board, but after that I found it easy to lose interest—my mind would wander, I would think about the execution, I would start skimming paragraphs. Beyond this, there is a story, Julie, that engaged in fatphobic and ableist rhetoric in a way that I found was not constructive—it didn't present the rhetoric in a way that the reader knew it was being questioned (i.e., tone, delivery, reception, etc.), it was simply presented as a fact and that didn't sit right with me. Overall, I may mention this book in passing but I wouldn't go out of my way to recommend it.

By turns creepy, insightful and bemusing, these are twelve deliciously weird short stories for your reading pleasure!

After reading Enriquez’s Our Share of Night last year, a long and complex novel that took dedication to read that was totally worth it, I snapped up the chance to read her new short story collection.

The stories are snippets of the weird and wonderfully macabre that satisfy the need for a little hit of horror. Enriquez has such a straightforward, engaging style that each piece grabbed me from the first few paragraphs, and I felt able to know her characters right away, along for the ride on their uncanny journey.

Enriquez’s genius for depth shone in several of the stories despite their brevity. There were so so many ghosts here. Ghosts of people who had died violent deaths, ghosts of the forgotten, ghosts seeking revenge, and the ghosts of loved ones haunting the minds of the living. She also adds nods to the disappeared of Argentine history: the dead are restless, and they compel the living to remember. Places that were once the domain of torture trap and torment still. Places hold power.

“Hyenas” is one of these stories, where a couple visits an abandoned mansion that had been the site of torture and end up in very unpleasant circumstances. “The Refrigerator Cemetery” too holds a guilty past that won’t stay buried. “My Sad Dead,” was perhaps my favourite story: a lament for the sad and angry dead.

And a shout out to the last story that had absolutely scary kids and reminded me the most of the tone of Our Share of Night. “I couldn’t compare it to seeing a gun under a pillow, or to the rustle of a rat among the trash bags or some night bird’s horrible screech. Not even to the bark of a starving dog or the sobs of a child who has suffered something unnameable. It wasn’t that sort of fear or revulsion. It was the terror that came from the cold of the grave, from finding blood soaked through an empty bed, from seeing madness in the eyes of someone about to hang. It was a glimpse beyond the wall of sleep.”

Thanks to NetGalley and Random House for a gifted copy.

2.5. I know a lot of authors love to lean into ambiguity—the unknown can create a strong sense of paranoia or fear—but for me, in this collection, that approach didn’t take most of the stories anywhere. I usually finish books of this length in a few hours, but this one took me a week and a half. On the surface, this collection definitely qualifies as horror and macabre—it’s gory, death ridden, filled with paranormal elements—but most stories lacked one of the best elements of good horror: suspense.

Many of the stories felt starved of buildup and left without any real resolution. However, I can say that like an artist, Enriquez paints vivid, detailed pictures that center the imagination, making each setting feel real and tangible. The cover and the title are absolutely striking, but beyond that, there wasn’t much else that really captured me. Out of the twelve stories, maybe three truly got my attention.

There was also a story that played off the well-known case from the Cecil Hotel, and while some might have found it macabre, I just found it uncomfortable and distasteful. Despite my feelings on this collection, I can still say I enjoy this author. I’ve read three of their four works, but both collections I’ve read have felt underwhelming. Honestly, I preferred Dangers of Smoking in Bed, and that’s saying something.

Thank you to NetGalley & Random House Publishing for this digital ARC.

Mariana Enriquez solidifies her place as one of the best contemporary horror writers. The stories in A Sunny Place draw on the horror of the past and how history, both national and familial , haunts the present. A neighborhood is haunted by the ghost of a young man who was murdered when none of the neighbors failed to save him. Several generations of women are stalked by a faceless assailant with backwards feet. Throughout these stories Enriquez combines the horrors of poverty and crime with the supernatural to create worlds where often times the real is just as harrowing as the supernatural.

4⭐️. My favorite horror writer has done it AGAIN! I am always mesmerized by Enríquez's writing. It pulls you in, twists your mind and won't let you go. Enríquez is such a talented storyteller and builds a strong, vivid world for these characters. These stories of pain, suffering, gore & thrill will certainly stick with me for awhile.

TY to Netgalley, Hogarth & Random House Publishing Group for an advance reading copy in exchange for an honest review.

Unnerving is the best way I can describe this collection of short stories. They're incredible - so rooted in realism and yet grotesque and macabre. My favorite stories were "Julie" and "Different Colors Made of Tears."

It's amazing these short stories allowed for the reader to become immediately engrossed in the world and provide resolution (some open-ended, some resolved) in such a short amount of time. I am always in awe of short story writers - I'm far too wordy for it.

Thank you to Netgalley, Mariana Enríquez, and Random House / Hogarth for an advanced copy in exchange for an honest review.

"A Sunny Place for Shady People" is a collection of short horror stories by Mariana Enriquez.

This was my first book by Enriquez and was left slightly disappointed. Since this was marketed as a horror book, I expected more of a build up and suspense with some of the stories but was disappointed when they felt to fall flat. Overall, I only enjoyed two or three stories and the remainder were underwhelming.

Amazing read!! The storyline is movie worthy!! I would recommend this book to everyone!!! Excited to read it with my bookclub!!!

Happy release day!!! I loved this collection of short horror and paranormal stories. South American fiction translations are some of my favorite, and this translation was atmospheric and engaging. You can really feel that you are in the story. Would definitely be interesting in reading more works by this author!

Thank you to Random House Publishing and NetGalley for an advanced reader copy in exchange for an honest review

I am a big fan of short story collections, in general. However - and this seems to be the nature of the form - many short stories often leave me wanting more; there's a sense of incompleteness when they're over. As someone who has only dabbled in writing fiction of my own, I know that a satisfying ending is the worst (and hardest!) part. That's why I was ultimately blown away by A Sunny Place for Shady People - Enriquez has achieved a collection of twelve stories that are each perfectly complete.

Now, onto the content of the stories themselves. In A Sunny Place for Shady People, readers are treated to a variety of scares that range from the mildly unsettling to the downright terrifying. Each scare is based in the supernatural yet reflects a terror that is all too real-world: loss, mortality, colonization, murder, family secrets, greed, sexual assault, addiction, aging, guilt, and disgust. In Night Birds, a young (un)dead girl worships her older sister's world of make believe. In Face of Disgrace, a woman inherits a disturbing maternal legacy from a mother that she hated. In Hyena Hymns, a couple accidentally enters a torturous dimension while exploring a mansion in ruins. In the titular story, a woman returns to the site of her grief and spends time with a cult that communes with a famous dead woman. In A Local Artist, a couple escapes to the countryside to seek tranquility instead they find a gradually escalating trap.

A Sunny Place for Shady People is out now and can be found in a bookstore or library near you! What are you waiting for?

A Sunny Place for Shady People by Mariana Enriquez is a haunting collection of short stories that delve into the depths of human suffering, loss, and the blurring of boundaries between the living and the dead. Through vivid imagery and haunting narratives, Enriquez creates a world where the mundane and the supernatural intertwine, offering a powerful exploration of grief, resilience, and the enduring nature of the human spirit. The stories are often unsettling and unnerving, like the remnants of a bad dream upon waking.

Most stories are set in Argentina, often in impoverished neighborhoods that contribute to the unsettling atmosphere. The characters, primarily women, grapple with a range of challenges, including poverty, violence, and loss. Enriquez explores the ways in which these experiences can be compounded by the supernatural, such as in "My Sad Dead," where a doctor stays in her dangerous neighborhood to care for the ghosts there, or in "Different Colors Made of Tears", in which cursed vintage clothing enacts violence on women.

One of the most striking aspects of the collection is Enriquez's ability to blend the mundane with the extraordinary, something I tend to associate with South American Magical Realism. In "The Suffering Woman," the narrator's reality begins to merge with that of a dying woman, blurring the lines between the living and the dead. Similarly, in "Julie," the narrator's encounter with their obese cousin and her ghostly lovers challenges traditional notions of reality and acceptance.

A Sunny Place for Shady People is a haunting and thought-provoking exploration of suffering, loss, and the supernatural. The collection is both poignant and unsettling, offering a powerful commentary on the human condition. I found the stories to be both moving and unnerving, and I look forward to revisiting these stories and reading more of Enriquez's translated works.

This review will be posted to Goodreads and Instagram (@goodquietkitty) on September 17, 2024.

Hauntingly and gorgeously written.
It's authors like Mariana that make me realize I love horror. I each story in here is so vivid and dripping with allegories.
Truly captivating book!

Mariana Enriquez is truly a master of storytelling. Each of these short stories drew me in so deeply that I could have read a whole novel based around each one. There was not a single story that I did not love. I can see myself returning to this collection again and again. The stories were atmospheric and nuanced. I don't think there is another short story collection out there that could rival this masterpiece.

This is okay - every interesting idea (and there are plenty!) is cut off at the knees; the number of times I felt like a story was finding its footing only to see it end prematurely was not only staggering but flat-out infuriating. I’m glad Enriquez has a relatively well-regarded novel, because the writing and the imagination here intrigue me enough to compel me to check it out, but the short story, as a form, seems to escape her… I need an arc! I need something to sink my teeth into! As is, this is a book entirely composed of setups - fascinating setups, sure, but setups nonetheless. It’s rare that I say something is both disappointing and intriguing but this fits the bill, for better and for worse.

Mariana Enriquez is such a brilliant writer. I really enjoyed this collection. It is truly impressive how much she is able to pack into all twelve of these stories. The atmosphere and characters shine through in each tale. This is really perfect for fall. I took my time with this book reading one story a week so I could really digest each story. I can't wait to see what Mariana does next.

Thank you to NetGalley and Random House Hogarth for the ARC in exchange for an honest review.

This was a really interesting mix of short stories. Some were spooky, some were disturbing, and a couple were just plain weird. I loved it! Short story collections typically have a few that I don’t care for, but I enjoyed all of these in different ways. My favorites were Julie and The Refrigerator Cemetery. Mariana Enríquez is an excellent story teller and the atmospheric creepiness is so impressive that I can’t wait to read what she does next.

This was an exceptional collection of short stories in the horror genre written by an Argentine author. Translated from Spanish this was so creepy, Erie, and just sinister down to its core.

This is probably one of the few short story collections where I liked more short stories than I didn't. You're always gonna have a mixed bag when it comes to short story collections but this one was definitely more on a positive side. Every story gave a gritty underbelly type of feel were you weren't quite sure if something was watching you or not.

Being somewhat of a documentary aficionado on the Cecil Hotel, I was so intrigued to see a story containing the hotel in the novel. It really was a surprise because I did not know it was in there, and it really heightened my reading experience. The stories had an incredible range from an ick factor to crawling skin to sinister eyes from your closet. Everything just felt so organic and every story elicited an emotional response.

Well, every story did have a few things that I liked about it. There were some stories where I just didn't like as much as I did. And therefore my enjoyment was not as high. But that is all personal preference and of course should not deter her from reading this book because whatever I didn't like you may love. That is the nature of short story collections, there's something for everybody.