The Hacienda

Can you tell I love Gothic haunted house books? Cañas knocked it out of the park with this deeply unsettling yet deeply touching ghost story set in the years following the Mexican War of Independence.

The characters were beautifully complex, and their struggles—both internal and external—were beyond compelling. I stayed up way too late to finish this gem in one sitting.  

I just finished this book, and it nourished my soul. The time frame and setting—Mexico in the early 1820s, just after the war for independence—were new to me. But the story of a fierce but delicate bride fighting ghosts in her new and unloved husband’s crumbling mansion pushed all my favorite goth girl buttons. The author does a fantastic job of making that world come to life without a single historical info dump. We know and we care about the history and politics because Beatriz, our heroine, knows and cares, and we care so much about her from the very… show more.

Two words: Hot Priest. Set after the Mexican War of Independence this book put me in a crisis. Too spooky to keep going and too hot to put down. What’s a girl to do? A beautiful impoverished Beatriz agrees to a marriage of convenience with a wealthy elite with a secret. How did his first wife die? One forgets… Once she arrives at the Hacienda, all hell breaks loose. Turns out, these walls can talk. She reaches out to the church for an exorcism (as one does) and in walks the Priest/ Mestizo Brujo of my dreams. What I love… show more.