Holy mother, this book. Chilling, compelling and beautiful, it is one of the most intense and impressive debuts I’ve read in ages. I gulped it down in two sittings and then could not sleep for love nor money. I can give no higher praise to a novel, frankly.

Orpheus Builds A Girl is the story of Dr Wilhelm von Tore, who, bereft at the loss of his wife to TB, attempts to return her to life. But von Tore’s story is not the only one - we also hear from Luciana’s sister, Gabriela, who weaves a very different story of her sister’s life and death. The result is an utterly unsettling novel that forces the reader to grapple with themes of consent, racism, misogyny and how we view desperate men in love.

We trace both narrators’ origins from childhood to the point where their stories collide. Wilhelm was born in Germany, became a Nazi (of course) and fled to America after the war - raised by his grtandmother and mother, he was always fascinated by the mystical, and how it might intersect with science. Meanwhile, Gabriela is the eldest of 5 Cuban siblings who escape civil unrest to start a new life in Florida. She dotes upon Luci, her strong-willed and fiery younger sister, who eventually falls prey to von Tore’s obsessions with her.

When Luci contracts TB, von Tore convinces the family that he is the only one who can save her; the family’s financial hardship means that they have no choice, and soon von Tore takes over the Madrigal home, and Luciana, entirely - even after she has sadly passed away. I wasn’t prepared for what happened next, though this isn’t a book where plot twists are paramount - instead it's the visceral and striking writing that captured my attention. It is all-consuming.

In an interview, Parry notes that “the book is really about obsession and self-delusion, as well as the structures that allow some men to wield great social power.” von Tore is written to be strikingly unlikeable - there were points that I gasped at his gross opinions and deeds. His all-consuming obsession with his own “genius” is what drives the novel - this is categorically not a love story. A slice of unnerving Gothic horror, and a book that will leave me feeling uneasy for a long, long time.

An ethical question about this book - as it is a fictional retelling of the real life exploitation of Maria Elena Milagro de Hoyos, whose body was stolen and held in the home of a man obsessed with her for seven years before then being paraded around for six months to the public like a side show act after her body was recovered - is this book further romanticizing and dehumanizing her or is it giving Maria a voice and providing a message so that we as readers are better able to share HER story and not her abuser's?

First, this book was slow, disjointed, and spent an absurd amount of time over explaining everything but I was more disturbed by the portrayal of the characters than anything else in this novel. Our female narrator, Gabriela, describes her sister Luciana as a wild young woman who was known for her beauty and rebelliousness while our male narrator, Wilhelm, describes his love of science and his unhealthy obsession with the women in his life from his grandmother to eventually Luciana in this almost lyrical way.

I was trying to understand why the author was putting so much effort into Wilhelm's narrative, the book even opens stating it's telling his story, his biography, with blurbs from Gabriela as rebuttals to his case. It took everything in me not to just put this aside and call it a day. I don't mind an unreliable or even an villainous narrator, but when the character is based on a real life monster I have some concerns. I didn't like Wilhelm, he by no means was a likeable character, but I still felt uncomfortable reading from a psychopaths point of view - knowing these events actually happened.

In the end I couldn't get over the relationship to the real life incident that inspired the book and I felt truly uneasy about Elena Milagro de Hoyos' tragedy being rewritten, yet again, with a male narrator romanticizing the story from his POV even though the author added the sister's perspective. It felt wrong.

I really enjoyed this book - especially the writing style. It's based on a really creepy true story (recommend looking that up after reading the book). It was almost like reading an obsessive love, true crime book. If that's what you like, highly recommend.