Silvia Morena-Garcia is an impressively versatile author, ranging between genres (SFF, romance, thriller, horror) and themes and, in my experience, she never disappoints.

In Untamed Shore she gives us a noir-tinged thriller which evokes classic films of the 40s, 50s and 60s - close your eyes and it isn't too much of a stretch to imagine this story taking place in black and white, acted out by the chiselled profiles and dangerous beauties of Golden Age Hollywood even though it's set slightly later, in 1979. That dating is important as it gives Untamed Shore the ability to reference and build on this stock of imagery so that Viridiana, our protagonist (herself named for a film heroine) comments knowingly about actors, themes and atmosphere.

And indeed that's entirely fitting. Into Viridiana's provincial world, to the little town in Baja California where she spends her summer watching the dead sharks rot, dodging strutting boys and resisting her mother's plots to marry her off - into this world comes a trio of glamorous strangers, American tourists who've taken a house for the summer.

Introduced to them by her father's friend, 'the Dutchman', Reinier, Viridiana takes on the role of guide, translator and secretary to Ambrose, his wife Daisy, and her brother, Gregory. There's a certain implied louche glamour to the the three, a sense of a past, of money and, soon, of danger. Staying in their house, Viridiana is well placed first to pry out secrets - to overhear things but also to locate what's not being said - and then, after a death, to become involved in those secrets.

At the same time, Moreno-Garcia shows us a young woman growing up in this back of nowhere town, yearning for the bright lights of Paris, or of Mexico City where her father is. But don't fall into the trap of seeing the place or its people as unsophisticated or backward. That's the mistake that Ambrose, Daisy and Gregory make, as well as others who come arrive later, once the trouble starts. This book isn't written from the perspective of the strangers who come to town - strangers who don't even bother to speak the language - rather it's an affectionate and almost loving depiction of things (even if it is a warts-and-all depiction) from the inside.

What matters to Viridiana is her future - that life away from the town. She studies the effects on that future of all the undercurrents here, the swirls of gossip and reputation, the formalities represented by the Mayor or the local policeman, and she understands - as the strangers don't - what can be managed, whether through an understanding of who is in what card game on a Friday night or a knowledge of who has interests where.

The book put me in mind, to a degree, of the typology of true crimes set out by the author George Orwell in his essay The Decline of the English Murder. Writing during the Second World War, Orwell lamented the displacement of the classic domestic murder (generally a middle aged husband ridding himself of his no longer wanted wife) beloved of the British Sunday papers, by a more public style of killing - and by younger killers, of both sexes, swimming in an atmosphere of drink, dance halls and flickering Hollywood. In actual fact the first type of killing remains with us of course - domestic violence doesn't go away so easily (as we see here) - but the second sort is and was incontestably more glamorous, if that's not a crass word to use, and Moreno-Garcia hits all the same notes here in telling a story that has femmes fatales, guns, hoodlums and duplicity in spades alongside a genuine streak of moral ambiguity.

I don't think there's anyone in this book who is altogether admirable, but nearly everyone is understandable - Moreno-Garcia gives us complex and real characters and to a degree you can sympathise with most of them (though I didn't take to Ambrose).

If you've read Moreno-Garcia's recent books, you will recognise some of the themes and settings here in Untamed Shore. Again we have a young woman growing up in a backwater who wishes to go places, a gloriously evocative portrayal of place and of being a certain age, watching an exciting world and fearing it will pass one by. While in others of this author's book these things come together via the supernatural, here it's a more prosaic, if also more criminal, route - it'll take every bit of Viridiana's determination to pull herself out of this mess - but there is a great sense here of her takes a chance in both hands when it comes. It's a wonderful read, and I'm glad to see this UK edition so that more readers can find there way to this story.

Strongly recommended.

Whilst i did enjoy this book, I’m not sure how to rate it. It’s a noir based in 70s Baja California with rich Mexican culture throughout. It follows Viridiana as she navigates strangers coming to town, getting hired as a personal assistant and the eventual murders that follow this. I did like Viridianas morally grey character but didn’t connect with anyone else. 3.5 stars.

As always, Silvia Moreno-Garcia has crafted a tale that transports me to another time and place. The story gets off to a slow start, but I didn't mind this because it helped me get to know the characters and setting better which was what helped me feel transported. It was easy to understand how the cultural expectations of yhe small town influenced the choices made by Viridiana.
I was invested in Viridiana's character development and evolution throughout the book.

I found this book to be slow starting. It took me around ⅓ of the book to start to be invested in the story.
While I don't think things were rushed, I do think this could have been a little longer to flesh out the characters and story more.
Certain things I felt there wasn't enough build up too. How Viridiana character growth happened. How she seemingly quickly switched personality. I would have liked to see more of the change in her.
I felt like parts of the story were missing in a way. While yes the story is complete I just wanted more build in areas.
While I did enjoy this, I wish some things weren't so easy to figure out. Especially who the bad guys were. Which maybe the point was to have them so obvious but guessing the truth so easily lowered my enjoyment a little.

I do hope Silvia writes more thrillers in the future as their was so much potential here.

The plot is as deep and dark as it gets, multi-layered with 'who knew what when?' as the strands come together and the finer details get filled in. This is an absolutely compelling, gripping book full of mystery and suspense. Only a few authors can write deeply involving psychological drama of the very highest quality.

The E-Book could be improved and more user-friendly, such as links to the chapters, no significant gaps between words some text written has been typed in red and a cover for the book would be better. It is very document-like instead of a book. A star has been deducted because of this.

Thank you very much to the author, publisher and Netgalley for this ARC.

"Untamed Shore" is a wonderful piece of noir, which bears the hallmark of Silvia Moreno-Garcia's writing: the flawed but admirable heroine, the restraints of society, the desire for something more and page after page of brilliant prose.

I loved every page of this novel and read through it pretty much in one sitting. The story is set in a small coastal town in Baja California in 1979 and does a great job transporting the reader in both time and place, as well as portraying rich and interesting side characters. The protagonist, Veridiana, daydreams bout a glamorous life and intriguing men who are nothing like her boring ex-boyfriend, Manuel, when a summer job brings new people into her life, a rich man, Ambrose, his beautiful young wife, Daisy, and her devilishly good looking brother, Gregory. She finds herself drawn closer into their world, which turns out to be darker and not at all like the movies.

"Untamed Shore" is an excellent noir read with its own twists and occasionally cruel events, which raise questions about seduction, love and human nature. I'd heartily recommend this book to anyone who likes darker reads, complex heroines and great prose.

Many thanks to NetGalley and Quercus Books, Jo Fletcher Books for an advanced copy of this book.

Untamed Shore by Silvia Moreno-Garcia
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⭐️⭐️⭐️ 3.5 stars
#UntamedShore #NetGalley
Thank you to NetGalley and Quercus Books for providing me with an e-copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.
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Baja California, 1979: 18-year-old Viridiana dreams of escaping her oppressive little village of Desengaño (disillusion.) When a wealthy American arrives with his wife and brother-in-law, Viridiana starts working for them as a personal assistant. When one of them dies, she finds herself entangled in a web of deceit.
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Silvia Moreno-Garcia is an author I've heard so much about and yet I had never picked up one of her books before, so I jumped at the chance of requesting this one to review. And I don't know if I hyped the author too much in my own mind and set my expectations too high, but I found this book mildly unsatisfying.
The writing is without a doubt outstanding; I loved the descriptions of Desengaño, I could feel and empathise with Viridiana's feelings of being trapped, of seeing no path ahead of her other than marriage and children, the amazing imagery and symbolism of the shark hunting.

But I thought the story that unfolded after the arrival of the three Americans was a bit basic. It was an obvious homage to the Film Noir and all the tropes of this genre were present and accounted for, but it was so predictable. Viridiana's naivety was a little bit frustrating for how long it lasted, but I correctly guessed every decision she made and everything that happened at every step of the story, which was a bit disappointing.
The only thing for me that elevated this book beyond a basic thriller was Moreno-Garcia's beautiful writing and for that reason, I will definitely pick up more of her books in the future.
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It happens rarely, but I just couldn't get into this novel — sorry. What happened to the writer's need to start her story in the middle in order to draw the reader in? The first half was all backstory — about the protagonist's background, her family, the things she liked doing growing up, some of the people she knew back then. And still, I felt I never really got inside her head. The other characters, too, seemed flat and two-dimensional.

While the pace picked up in the second half of the novel, the quality of the writing — which had never been great to begin with, deteriorated even further. The climax to the story, thus, came across as confused and poorly executed. A shame, since the initial premise of the novel had sounded promising. I guess this one just wasn't for me.

With thanks to the publishers and Netgalley for the ARC