Velvet Was The Night

VELVET WAS THE NIGHT

by Silvia Moreno-Garcia

 

Nomination: LA Times Finalist 2021

 

Read: September 8, 2022

 

Considered a noir masterpiece, Velvet Was The Night is an intricate narrative that grabs you from the very first page. Set in 1970’s Mexico, intense political upheaval has turned friends into enemies and those you trust cannot really be trusted. 

 

Sprinkled throughout are references to songs popular then and a playlist is even included at the end of the book. Moreno-Garcia includes these references because the Mexican government was actively trying to suppress rock music at the same time they were trying to suppress the student and activist uprisings. 

 

Different factions were formed to confront these uprisings, some of them trained by the CIA. Elvis, one of the more prominent characters, is a member of the Hawks, which are in danger of being shut down in favor of another faction. Elvis’ task is to find a missing girl, Leonora, who supposedly has incriminating film, although no one knows what is actually in those pictures.

 

Maite, my favorite character, is a lonely woman, stuck in a rut between work and pinching pesos and addicted to romance comic books like Secret Romance. By Leonora asking Maite to watch her cat, Maite is thrust into a world she has never known, full of danger, intrigue and violence. By her side throughout this ordeal is Ruben, an ex-boyfriend of Leonora’s who is hell-bent on keeping Maite safe. Many readers find Maite to be self-centered and vapid but I found her to be feisty and strong. If you are single with no children, how can you not be the center of your life? Nothing wrong with that…

 

With much in-fighting, spying and, again, violence, we are allowed into a world that not many are aware of, myself included. Called the Dirty War, the political uprisings in Mexico brought out the worst of many people. Moreno-Garcia deftly pulls back the curtain on this world and brilliantly shines a light on how dangerous and uncertain it all was. I cannot wait to read more from her.

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