A punked cocktail

Cool cover English edition.

La mucama de Omicunlé (Tentacle) by Rita Indiana.

I had a recent streak of books that leave me wondering on how to consider them. This was one of them. Did I enjoy reading it? No, it was nasty. Do I think it is a good book? Yes. I have been there before, but the other detail that defined the latest experiences was that as I thought it was brilliant, some of its flaws and aspects that I disliked (subjective, of course) were big too.

First off, I think the whole plot was very smart, some turns were very neat and I didn’t see them coming at all. The whole setting was different and interesting. It has a gritty and harsh quality that feels a lot more apocalyptic than a lot of books. Themes like race, class, religion, the absence of morality in survivor mode come strong in the narrative and can give you a headache or two.

The main characters are very well defined and feel very real, you really want them to pull through or to fail (eh, depending which one), getting invested with them very quickly.

Random mumbling.

It made me consider about what it is usually expected from heroes, more an antihero in this case, but still. Mild Spoilers. How can we ask everything from a hero, including sacrifice, when the hero has never had something? We assume people will sacrifice everything because it is needed, morally right or correct, when they may don’t have the tools to do it, the mental and affective frame to make that choice. Who is at fault, the hero or the blank expectation? End of Spoilers.

Now, the parts that were not so good for me. The setting, as much as it was interesting, it didn’t mesh through the story. You have a natural disaster that infects people and along the way you forget about it, because it seems it has no major consequence, the infected are dropped rather quickly and appear to be not more than an element of shock. No other direct ramifications from the natural disaster are shown in the life of people. Some cool futuristic details don’t make a complete picture of a timing either, the different time frames have little distinction on their core.

Finally, an even more subjective consideration related to my displeasure when reading the book: the female figures felt empty and a complete vehicle to the male machinations and plot. As for being violent and harsh, it is part of a narrative and setting the author wanted to portray, but it became too much. The crass sexual and violent thoughts in Argenis mind came through more exploitative or with the intention to shock or disgust more than a needed part of the narrative, I think you could transmit the message without getting overboard with it and I felt it made a disservice to the poignant experiences the characters suffer.

And then...

It is a very good book, clever, rough and original, but I can’t say it is an experience I want to keep present.