I usually LOVE Silvia Moreno-Garcia's books so I was really excited to read Velvet Was the Night but this one was not a favorite of mine. It took me a while to get situated in the story so the first half of the book went really slowly. then, just as I'm invested in all of the characters, it comes to a rather unsatisfying ending. On the flip side, it was an interesting look at a time period I wasn't overly familiar with in Mexican history which I did appreciate.

Velvet Was the Night was very different from what I expected, but I enjoyed learning more about a time in history I knew almost nothing about. The story itself was a slow burn, and while I was interested to know where the plot would lead, it ultimately fell flat for me.

I absolutely loved Mexican Gothic so I was hyped for this one.
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It’s 1971 in Mexico City during the Guerra Sucia (Dirty War). Protests are happening, people are rebelling and students standing up to the government. Our main characters are Maite who works as a secretary and reading romance comic books. She hates her job and feels like she’s overshadowed by her family. Then there is Elvis. Elvis is part of Los Halcones (The Hawks, a group that people didn’t want to say existed). Los Halcones were to have been trained by the CIA and Elvis was tasked with taking away cameras from the media and people.
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Both Maite and Elvis are trying to Leonora who is Maite’s neighbor but both are looking for her for two complete different reasons. Leonora hires Maite to look over her cat and when she doesn’t come home she starts looking for her because she needs her money. Elvis is looking for her because she is supposed to be in possession of some pictures that the government doesn’t want to get out.
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This noir was slow paced and I’ll be honest and say Maite was not a favorite character at first but as time passed I grew to like her as she evolved through the story. Elvis was the standout for me in the book and we get to see how he starts questioning what’s going on. I LOVED how this book wove in real life events into the story. There were more than one incident where students were attacked and killed. Tlaltelolco Massacre, look it up. Corpus Christi in 1971. Rock music was a way to rebel and make a statement but then rock music was also suppressed. If you enjoy some mystery and history then I highly recommend this book. Also, the author also added some info on GR which also provides more background info.
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Thanks to @netgalley @delreybooks for my review copy.

I typically love political elements in my fantasy stories, but I dont think I've ever encountered them in a fiction/mystery novel before, and I have to say Silvia Moreno-Garcia blended everything perfectly. The mystery and intrigue was grounded by the real world political references and provided a truly unique experience.

I do love historical fiction and I did enjoy this book. I just felt that it started off slow. I would say the last 25% really picked up and I was fully invested at that point.

Love the cover!!

I picked up Silvia's new book because it sounded like a good story about Maite who is a secretary in Mexico City. Her neighbor drops her cat off and then goes missing, however, people (the dangerous men) start asking Maite where her neighbor is. Maite then tries to go find her neighbor before the men do.

I found this to be boring. I thought we were getting a strong female main character. I wanted more action from this book and a stronger female main character.

The lovely cover and title are enticing and certainly drew me to this book. However, the overall experience fell quite flat for me. While I do like that Moreno-Garcia is not an author easily pigeon-holed into one type of genre writing, there is something to be said for knowing a genre well and engaging with it on its terms. Here in this new novel, the attempt at noir felt forced and simplistic: flat characters with little chemistry, little sex or violence, no femme fatale, no anti-hero, and virtually no character evolution for the two main characters, Maite and Elvis.
As with Mexican Gothic, there is interesting history here and I learned quite a bit about the Mexican Dirty War of the 70s. I think the author captures the 1970s overall, and I liked the setting. It's my favorite part of the book and the book's saving grace. Otherwise, this book was a slog to get through.

Maite is alone. She lives alone, dreams alone, and feels judged and ignored by her family. To distract herself from this reality, she reads romance comics and listens to records of American music. Her collection is large and gives her an escape and adds a flavor and drama to her life that she doesn't get otherwise. Her job doesn't pay well, her car is stuck in the shop because she doesn't have enough money to pay for it, and she spends what little money she has on things that make her happy. Then one day her neighbor comes to her asking if she could watch and feed her cat for her for a couple days, and while Maite would rather not do that, she could use the money and also add to her collection of stolen goods.

Elvis is a member of the Hawks. A group that has a role in bringing a certain kind of violence to things. There are reporters to punch, cameras to break, and people to watch and intimidate. He works for El Mago, a man who has control and poise to a T. Elvis wants to impress him and be a favorite of his, His eagerness to prove himself lands him a leader role among his group. When tasked with staking out and watching a woman, he gathers himself and does his best to lead the team. But like most things, there's more going on with this story and soon Elvis is digging deeper and deeper and finds himself in situations that could end with his demise.

This mystery thriller was interesting. I really enjoyed the setting, it's in a town in Mexico that is on the poorer side, but is also bustling. I also enjoyed how much music played a role in this, I'm always a fan for music in books and this was no exception. On the whole though this didn't do much for me. I found myself having a hard time getting through it and even picking it up. I had the time to read it, but not the motivation. Compared to the other novel by Silvia, I found this one to be a little lacking in the intensity. For a thriller to lack intensity is a miss for me.

I still have faith that I will find a book by this author that I really love so I will continue to pick up her books. Because there is something intriguing about her stories and I do want to keep reading them. Let me know what you thought of this book or if you have any recommendations for books by this author.

Even though this is labeled as historical fiction I don't feel like I closed the book and knew anything more about Mexico in 1970.

The story is told from the point of view of Maite and Elvis. Maite is a dowdy woman who basically lives in a fantasy world influenced by the romantic comic books she reads and music. She spends most of her money on records and books she doesn't read. Elvis is a reluctant thug. He was taken off the streets by El Mago as a teen and trained to fight in his organization, the Hawks. He has taken on the name Elvis because of his love of music. In order to make extra money Maite does some pet sitting so when her neighbor, Leonora, asks her to feed her cat for a few days Maite agrees but then Leonora doesn't come home. She receives a phone call from her asking her to meet her with the cat and a box she left behind and from there she disappears and Maite gets entangled with student activists. On the other side El Mago enlists Elvis and his crew to find Leonora.

This was very slow moving for me. I didn't like Maite much. She lied to her friends to make her life more exciting and she stole from the people she pet sit for. Elvis was a bit more likeable. He had a rough start in life and did the best he could with no education. After searching Maite's apartment looking for some film that Leonora left behind he becomes intrigued by Maite and her record collection. Both characters seemed shallow and could have done with more character development. I didn't feel like I was rooting for anyone. I found the end wrapped up too quickly and found it unsatisfactory.

I would like to thank Netgalley and Random House Ballantine for providing me with a copy of this book. These opinions are mine and mine alone.

This is one of those books where I liked it but I also didn't. I couldn't stop reading, but also kinda hated everyone. Much like Mexican Gothic, Moreno-Garcia let's her book simmer. It isn't full of action...until it is. She makes locations feel alive and a part of the book. I liked the way the different story lines met eventually, I just wished maybe it happened sooner. Stunning cover.

Published by Del Rey on August 17, 2021

Velvet Was the Night is a story of Mexican noir. Set in the early 1970s, the novel takes as its background a CIA funded and Mexican government-supported effort to organize private citizens as shock troops (known as Hawks) to attack protesting students. The CIA wanted to suppress communism and the Mexican government wanted to suppress dissent. Those machinations cemented Mexico’s authoritarian oppression and laid the foundation for the Dirty War.

Maite is caught in the middle of that struggle. She isn’t political. She doesn’t feel she’s much of anything. Her days, as she sees them, are dull and meaningless. Her sister berates her for wasting her life. As she turns 30, Maite is a single, insecure woman who devours romance comics, wishing her life were filled with the love and drama she reads about.

Maite can’t afford to pay for her car repairs. She supplements her income as a secretary by looking after her neighbors’ pets when they are away. Maite’s only vice is her occasional theft of a small object from a neighbor’s apartment.

Maite has been feeding Leonara’s cat. She’s vexed that Leonara hasn’t returned from her trip. When Leonara finally calls Maite and asks her to bring the cat and a box to an address, Maite becomes even more annoyed when Leonara doesn’t appear. She decides to track down Leonara so she can get paid. Her quest leads her to a group of wannabe revolutionaries and brings her to the attention of the Hawks and the secret police.

The other protagonist, Elvis, is a Hawk. At 21, he is the right age to blend with and infiltrate student groups. He admires his boss, El Mago, and is more committed to following El Mago than to any political philosophy. Elvis doesn’t mind administering beatings to send a message, but he draws the line at beating women or killing anyone. He’d rather be doing something else with his life but he doesn’t know what else he is capable of doing.

The novel alternates chapters that follow either Elvis or Maite. Their paths intersect when El Mago assigns Elvis to follow Maite. El Mago wants to find some pictures that Leonara has hidden. He hopes that Maite will lead him to Leonara.

Maite and Elvis are linked in unexpected ways, particularly by their passion for music. Elvis is impressed by the record collection he discovers while snooping through Maite’s apartment. Elvis took his name from the obvious source, but he’s also a fan of Sinatra and American standards. Maite enjoys the Spanish versions of those songs. The government has closed singing cafés and banned American rock because it views dancing as a form of anarchy, but the government can’t stop Maite or Elvis from enjoying music.

As one would expect of authoritarians and revolutionaries, none of the characters trust each other. The revolutionaries correctly believe they have an informant in their midst. An agent of the secret police named Anaya is sure that his sources are all lying to him. The Hawks and the secret police share the goal of disrupting perceived communists but they share nothing else. A Russian KGB agent adds another level of intrigue to the story. A relative of Leonara seems to want her dead. Elvis becomes increasingly disillusioned as his friends die, particularly when he learns the identity of one of the killers.

For Elvis, the story is one of intellectual disenchantment and personal growth as he begins to realize that the Hawks and their methods pose a greater threat to Mexico than the harmless student protestors. For Maite, the story is one of romance followed by inevitable heartbreak followed by the unlikely possibility of a new romance. The protagonists’ stories are simple, but they are built on strong characterizations and on the novel’s complex noir setting.

RECOMMENDED

This was my fourth Silvia Moreno-Garcia read and as she usually notes with every new release, it is much different from her previous books. Although this noir mystery was a quick read at the start, I found myself becoming progressively less interested as it went on. The historical aspect of the novel is what kept me engaged more than anything and had me researching more about this time period and political moment in the history of Mexico. The pacing was quite slow and at one point I started to skimming through the chapters from Elvis' perspective in particular as it became repetitive. I may have to read other noir novels to compare this to in an effort to not completely write off the genre, but this book didn't particularly make it one that I care to get into more anytime soon.

Unfortunately this story did not grab my attention as much as I wanted it to. The author's writing is gorgeous but I think this story was just not the one I was ready to read.

The book Velvet Was the Night tells the story of two individuals who are tangentially interacting in 1970s Mexico. One of them, a member of the Hawks, is following a woman who may have information that could challenge the validity of the Hawks. I thought this was an engaging story, but I personally did not enjoy it as much as I did her previous novel, Mexican Gothic. However, if you enjoy stories with intrigue and historical fiction about little-known historical eras, this book is great!

I admit that I was not a fan of "Mexican Gothic," but everyone else loved it so much that I figured I would try this next book written by Moreno-Garcia. Unfortunately, I just don't think she is my type of author.

While the words on the page did not quite grab me, the visuals that I had in my brain while reading were FANTASTIC. This being a noir thriller set in 1971, I think a screen adaptation of it would be far more appealing to me.

But I can appreciate that this is a well written book, so I will still be recommending it to people who like her style!

It's the 1970s, and Maite is a voracious reader who disappears into their own world. Leonora lives nearby, someone Maite secretly envies, but when she disappears, Maite can't help but look for her. In the background is Elvis, a criminal watching Maite's every move. These characters collide in a suspenseful and dark way that keeps the reader turning pages. Highly recommend.

Silvia Moreno-Garcia is quickly becoming one of my favorite authors.

In "Velvet Was the Night," we meet Maite and Elvis, whose lives can't be more different but eventually intertwined due to the disappearance of Maite's neighbor, Leonora. Set in 1970's Mexico, "Velvet Was the Night" is a historical noir that reads like a sepia filter was dropped over the pages.

I can tell that this book will not be for everyone given the historical setting and the slow-burn nature of the plot. As usual, Moreno-Garcia excels in her ambiance and settings. The descriptions, the references, the characters...they all read as if it were the 1970s. It has all the vibes. While the characters are not the most likable bunch, their depictions worked with the chosen setting, and I was invested in the mystery that was slowly unfolding. Being Puerto Rican, I love reading any references to Latinx cultures; in this case, I love (and am grateful for) all the different Spanish-language names that Moreno-Garcia chooses. She uses names that are different from those traditionally heard and known by Anglophone audiences and uses the correct punctuation marks for them. While I still enjoyed Mexican Gothic better than this book, it was a good read, and I would recommend it for people who like slow-burn mysteries.

When I first started the novel, I was under the impression this was historical fiction; however, I was not familiar with what noir was in terms of genre. I thought the beginning was a lot of exposition, but once I researched what were elements of noir, I reflected back on what I already read and everything made sense for me! Understanding the elements of the genre transformed my reading experience. Moreno-Garcia excelled at the writing style for noir, as well as the addition of historical aspects in the plot.
I especially loved the consistent insertions of music that was either playing or that the narrator thought to imagine would be playing at that moment. It elevated the enjoyment of the text due to this use of tone. I was able to visualize each scene in my head as if I were watching a film.
Overall, I enjoyed this narrative. Silvia Moreno-Garcia really knows how to write in different genres well! It was a lovely surprise!

Thank you to Netgalley and the publisher for providing me with an e-arc in exchange for an honest review!

Velvet was the Night is a twisty noir mystery set in the tumultuous streets of Mexico City in the 1970s. Maite scrapes by a living as a secretary. Every night, she escapes into the world of her romance comics and American records. However, she's soon drawn into a plot involving her mysterious next-door neighbor and a missing roll of film that could expose the government's anti-protest thugs, the Hawks. Elvis, one of the Hawks, is tasked with finding the film that could expose him and his team. But he finds himself intrigued by Maite, and relates to her loneliness and love for music.

This was my first of Moreno-Garcia's books, and I absolutely loved it! It's definitely different from what I usually read in terms of the genre and setting, but the dark atmosphere and complex heroes drew me in. Readers are sure to relate to both Maite and Elvis who are both deeply flawed but trying their best to survive. The secondary cast of student revolutionaries was also super interesting as we explored their differing motivations.

Overall a quick read and a great introduction to a period of history often glossed over.

For this one I had to DNF very early on. I just could not get into this one. I do hope to try it again and will update my thoughts at that time.