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1. how does the author make it seem that Agnes's body has been there for so long in history?

2. How does the author describe the house in the final chapter to remind the readers of how historical it was?

The author describes Agnes's body as "dead and buried" and describes the array of mushrooms all over her body. In addition, the clothes that Agnes was wearing had been "long dissolved into dust". This shows just how long ago Agnes must've been put here. The author really puts emphasis on how long Agnes has been laying here in order to show the depth of the history of the Doyle family.
In addition, the author also makes important historical marks when Noemi, Catalina, and Francis are running through the depths and secret passages of the house to find a way out. The author describes the old house in immense detail and often mentions the snake symbol. This symbol is mentioned many times in the book as it is in many parts of High Place.  A family sort of motto or crest like this one was popular in the 11th-17th century, so for it to be in High Place so much, shows just how ancient this family is. Also, as they are running through the house chandeliers, stone floors, a bunch of the color yellow, and a stone dais were mentioned. I wouldn't say this type of interior is modern. The first use of a stone dais was in the 13th century and they were uncommon after the 1600s. Although, stone Dias's became popular again in the 19th century. Overall, you can tell that High Place is very historical through the details in the house.

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"Put the facts together, you fool, she told herself, chewing on a nail.  And what were

the facts? That her cousin spoke about a

presence in this house, including voices.

Ruth also described voices. Noemí had heard no  voices,  but  she’d had  bad  dreams and

sleepwalked, which she hadn’t done in years".(176)

Thoughts:
Here Noemi is assessing everything going on in the house. She is now considering the fact that there might be a supernatural presence in the house. Noemi is beating herself up about not figuring out what is going on and you can tell it's really bothering her.

Questions:
Will Noemi ever hear voices like the ones her cousin hears?
did her cousin sleepwalk and have dreams also?

Epiphanies:
Soon Noemi will figure out what is going on in the house because she has started asking questions. Noemi realizes something is going on and it seems she will do anything to figure it out.

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1. How does the author change the syntax between atmosphere?

2. Why is Catalina’s tone different from the letter compared to in person?

Throughout the first chapter, we are introduced to Noemi and her father. Her father had called her home early from a party she was attending to inform her about her cousin, Catalina. Before her father told Noemi what had happened with her cousin, we can see that the author was forming the sentences casually with a bit of formality. Reading the dialogue between her and her father, we get the impression that they are comfortable with one another when they talk but they talk properly. It was the same when Noemi was talking to Huego. For example, on page 4 it says, “it’s so much more fun when a gentleman offers a lady a cigarette,” when Noemi is talking to Huego. A lot of people don’t talk like that in regular conversations. Therefore even though they were having a regular conversation, the author adds a touch of formality to make it seem like they are proper in a way. However, it changes completely when she is talking to her father about her cousin. When the father showed Noemi the note Catalina had written, the author changed the syntax to make it seem more deranged, like Catalina was indeed going crazy. One line says, “I am Catalina Catalina Taboada. CATALINA. Cata, Cata come out to play.” The author decides to format the wording like this to show how Catalina is going through what seems to be a psychological breakdown. If the author were to have written this line like how she did between Huego and Noemi, we would not be able to get the sense of how gone Catalina has become. We wouldn’t be able to see this character going through some type of mental break, but we would see her as just another character possibly going through a rough time. The author making the choice to format Catalina’s letter like this was a smart choice to show the emphasis of Catalina going crazy.

From when Catalina was first introduced in the book, we got our first impression of her from the letter sent to Noemi’s father. Like I said above, the author wrote Catalina’s letter to portray to the audience that she had truly gone mad. She wanted us to feel how she felt in that moment when Catalina was writing that letter, so we can see how crazy she must have felt in her own home. However, when Noemi finally got to Catalina’s and her husband's house, her demeanor had completely changed. She seemed as if she was normal and that she had never written that letter in the first place. The author wrote her character in person completely different from how she portrayed her in the letter. The author wrote how Catalina had said that she was sick from tuberculosis and had a high fever, along with little to no recollection of what the letter she wrote. The author portrayed Catalina as fragile and very properly spoken, which is the exact opposite of what we saw in the letter. I believe that the author decided to make this choice with her writing on this character to confuse the reader on what is actually happening to her. Since all of this is happening within the first four chapters of the book, the author isn’t going to reveal the whole secret to why Catalina is acting that way just in the beginning. I believe she is doing this to create suspense and some sort of confusion for the reader to keep them on their toes and to guess why Catalina wrote the letter and why she is acting completely different in person. It can also make the readers second-guess if Catalina actually wrote the letter, with the possibility of it being written from someone else trying to impersonate Catalina. Overall, I think the author made a good choice writing Catalina completely different in person than from the letter so it can keep the audience guessing and create more questions than answers so they can continue reading.

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Quote: "In Cinderella, the sisters cut off their feet, and Sleeping Beauty's stepmother was pushed into a barrel full of snakes. That particular illustration on the last page of one of the books Catalina used to read to them suddenly came back to her." (86)

Thoughts

As I was reading chapter 8 at first I was kinda confused with this quote of the novel. Fairytales are mentioned in some passages for different reasons either to give an insight into Nomei’s childhood or to compare them to a situation she was in at the time. Another thing I noticed was that Catalina loved fairytales growing up with Noemi, maybe this is a way Noemi can connect to Catalina to make up for those times they haven’t seen each other? Or maybe this is a way of showing how Noemi compares this tragically.

Questions

Was she comparing this to tragic?

Was bad luck following the family?

Epiphanies

I realized I believe this is her way of coping with a situation or comparing her situation to something tragic as she mentioned the gruesome events from Cinderella and Sleeping beauty as both of those stories are known to have not-so-happy endings.

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Quote:  “Noemi  heard heartbeats, as loud as a drum, calling for her. It woke her up.”

Thoughts:

As I reread chapter 11 I can come to an understanding that the heart beats she heard could have been Ruths, from her killing everyone. It could have been that she was scared of what she was doing. I was confused at the beginning of the chapter since it says “it woke her up” but at the end it said that she was sleep walking and that Virgil woke her up. Noemni sees the golden women again in the chapter, and it makes her know “terror” that could be another reason as if the heart beats were in the backgroud, she could have been hearing her own as she slept.

Questions:

How was she seeing Ruth?

Was she actually sleep walking?

What does the heartbeat actually mean?

Does the author have a particular reason on what the heart beat is supposed to create?

Epiphany:

When I finished reading I thought that it was supposed to create suspense, the heart beat in the background was supposed to create some type of suspense to what she was seeing and what could have been happening after she woke up.

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“He shrugged, as if apologizing, unable to match her high spirits. He was bashful and a little odd. And she liked him in a different way than she liked the bold boys she knew, different from Hugo Duarte, whom she liked mostly because he danced well and resembled Pedro Infante. This was a warmer feeling, more genuine.”(110)

Thoughts:
I am starting to recognize how Noemi feels about Francis. It seems that she has never had a genuine love connection with anyone all her life and that she is a flirt who has been in many relationships for social status. With this passage she mentions that how she felt about him was different than “the bold boys she knew”. I am very drawn to the last line where she says “This was a warmer feeling, more genuine.” This line makes it seem as if she likes Francis for his personality and has a genuine connection with him.

Questions:
Why does Noemi like Francis? Is it because he is different from everyone she’s been with or does she actually like him? Why does the author bring up Hugo here? Is Noemi aware that she has romantic feelings for Francis? Or does she just like him as a friend?  If Francis is a love interest what does that mean for Catalina?

Epiphanies:
This made me realize that Noemi has never had genuine feelings for someone before. It seems back at home she had many relationships that were never serious but more flirtatious and for social reasons. A reason for this may be because of her fathers pressure for her to marry. She may be just picking up guys and dating them, even without a connection, because she wants her father to think there is a chance of her getting married. And so, when she meets Francis and experiences this “warmer feeling” she is surprised and doesn’t know how to act.

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" Noemi adjusted her rebozo , trying to find warmth in its folds, but the cemetery was terribly damp and chilly; she could almost swear the temperature had dropped a couple of degrees the more they’d pressed into it. She shivered, and he noticed.

“I’m so stupid,” Francis said, removing his sweater. “ Here, have this”

“It’s fine. Really, I couldn’t let you freeze for my sake. Maybe if we start walking back I’ll be better.”  "

I thought this was weird. I found it weird that the author wanted to create a romantic connection between Noemi and Francis. I feel like it almost derives from a more important story. I think this is the author also trying to show that Noemi is distracted from her “mission” which is trying to find out if her cousin is okay.

Some questions I have are :

What are Francis’ intentions with Noemi ?

Why exactly did he take her to the grave yard.

I think that from the start, although not obvious, Francis may have had a thing for Noemi. But I feel like that this may be forced somehow by the other Doyles. It can also be so that Noemi has an attachment to the house and decide to not leave either.

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This week on the Code Switch podcast, we tried to settle a months-long debate we've been having on the team: Which kind of books are best to read during the pandemic? Ones that help you escape our current reality? Or ones that connect you to it on a deeper level? In doing so, we got a chance to catch up with the authors of some of our favorite pandemic reads. We'll be sharing interviews with those authors throughout the week. First up, we have a conversation with Silvia Moreno-Garcia, author of Mexican Gothic.

I read Mexican Gothic on a Saturday night this summer, curled up on my couch with a cider and a tray of cookies. (Prior to starting, I had been warned that I would not be able to stop reading until I finished the book. That turned out to be true. I was also warned by NPR books editor Petra Mayer that I would never look at mushrooms the same way. Unfortunately, that also turned out to be accurate.)

Set in 1950s Mexico, Mexican Gothic is the story of Noemí, a young woman who gets summoned to a small mountain mining town to check up on her ailing cousin, who has recently been married off to a handsome and mysterious Englishman. What happens next is pretty typical of Gothic literature: girl arrives at creepy isolated mansion, girl realizes the vibes are way off, girl devises a plan to GTFO.

But Mexican Gothic enters some new territory. The town Noemí arrives in has been colonized by the aforementioned British family. So Noemí's escape plan includes a reckoning not just with a handful of sinister individuals, but with the forces of race, empire and colonialism.

I spoke to Silvia Moreno-Garcia about her book. Our conversation has been edited and condensed for clarity.
Tell us about the main character, Noemí. What is she like?
Noemí Taboada is a socialite from Mexico City. She is very intelligent and well educated. She is going to university and wants to pursue a master's degree, but her family has been reluctant to allow it. One reason why she decides to go to the mountains to take a look at her cousin is because she's promised the opportunity of going to university to continue her studies if she does that, as a sort of exchange. So she's smart and she's determined. She's also a bit flighty. She likes dancing and parties and pretty boys and having fun. She's a very modern 1950s girl.
Most classic Gothic novels take place in Europe, with a few exceptions. Why did you decide to set this in Mexico, and what does that do to alter the genre?
The direct inspiration for this novel was a real town in Mexico that is located in kind of the middle part of the country in the mountains. It's called Real del Monte or Mineral del Monte. It was mined by the Spanish first, and then in the 1800s, the British came and they started mining there. And that's how it earned its nickname of "Little Cornwall."

It has an English cemetery, just like in my book. And that is what inspired the novel. I went there one time and I was walking around the cemetery and it was misty. And it's kind of chilly and rainy there, especially certain times of the year. And I looked around and I thought, this is something out of a Hammer film. So it never really quite left me.

But the other reason to set it there is because, I think when people think about Mexico, sometimes they do know that it was conquered by the Spanish. And they think the Spanish left and that was it. That was the only case of colonialism that existed. But obviously, many other forces came into Mexico throughout the years and engaged in explicit warfare or more subtle types of control. So the French were there. We had a brief French empire in Mexico. The British were there, as I mentioned, in Real del Monte, but also in the South, trying to gain some kind of control in Yucatan. Americans came and all sorts of foreign interventions have taken place throughout the history of Mexico. And I just thought it was an interesting bit of the colonial legacy, to look at the British legacy, and to set it in Mexico to examine some of those forces colliding.
Many Gothic novels have elements of fear or supernatural or horror. In this book, one of the things that adds to that horror is that the patriarch in the family is a eugenicist and a colonizer. Can you talk about that?
My master's degree was in science and technology studies, and my thesis was actually on eugenics, women and the work of H.P. Lovecraft. So I know a lot about eugenics. So one of the easy answers is because I knew a lot about it.

But the reason why I became interested in eugenics was because there was a widespread scientific movement at the time. People took it very seriously. Eugenics was found in textbooks. You would see it in women's magazines, like the equivalent of seeing it in Cosmo nowadays, or Good Housekeeping. Obviously, scientists were discussing it. So it was appearing in science journals, but it also made its way into common parlance, made its way into laws and regulations, you know, deciding things like sterilization, but also immigration.

And it was exported. It started in England, but it was widely adopted in other countries. Obviously in the United States, which was one of the places where sterilization laws really seemed to flower in certain states. You know, people were not allowed to have children; were sterilized against their will. But it also spread into other parts, and manifested in many different ways.

And obviously, when you come to places like Mexico and other states that were colonized, that question of race becomes very interesting because there's obviously a lot of race-mixing going on in these nations. And so it's not the same sort of eugenics that they're handling in Great Britain, where there is this great anxiety about miscegenation. It's a little bit different. It's still highly racist, but it's not exactly the same kind of thought process that is going on. And I just always found it so interesting how Europeans view the colonies as a space of fear, because it is that space where people are coming together and mixing.
But, without giving too much away, part of the dynamic in the book is also that these people who have protected their whiteness for so long need Noemi, in part because she doesn't share their same genes.
Well, I think one of the things that happens with women of color, both in literary spaces and in real life, is that even though there is a certain sense of objection, of disgust to the brown body, there is also a sense of desire, and of using the brown body in any way that whiteness sees fit. So for example, with sex tourism you see that a lot, where women's bodies become cheap commodities that white men can acquire very easily. And in my interactions with people, when I was younger I've seen that in my contact sometimes with white men, I became an object of exotic pursuit. And the implications of that were that because I was Latina, I was easy. An easy sexual conquest. And available in a way that white women would not be.
On Code Switch we talk a lot about the importance of language. One of the things I found interesting about this book was how important language becomes. The patriarch of the family that's terrorizing Noemie doesn't speak Spanish - which means that she's able to use Spanish to her advantage. How did you think about that?
Sometimes people say, well, it's unrealistic that they didn't learn Spanish, these colonizers. And let me tell you - it's not unrealistic, right?
What book have you loved reading during this pandemic?
When I was growing up and living in Mexico, at one point I worked for an English language newspaper. And we had an English language newspaper precisely because there was an audience that could consume it and basically didn't know a word of Spanish. And I would sometimes, you know, meet people that would be like, "Oh, well, you know, I've lived in the country for 10 years. I haven't learned, you know, any Spanish at all." So that was not unrealistic.

But in this case specifically, it is also a desire to maintain a certain kind of purity. It's not only a racial purity - it's a whole kind of white purity, with the house looking specifically the way it does in order to maintain a certain structure. They bring British earth, so they can grow things that they grew over there basically. And the mimicking of all of these social customs is for a reason. That's why they are old-fashioned. It's because [the patriarch] Howard Doyle is clinging to a kind of idealized past.

Oh, that's such a hard question. Well, for scary books, I read The Only Good Indians by Stephen Graham Jones. I recommend that one a lot, because it has the classic 1980s horror feel. So if you liked Stephen King's It or Peter Straub's Ghost Story, you will definitely like it. But it has a twist. It feels fresh. So sometimes people are like, well, they don't make them like they used to. And this definitely is "like they used to." But it will also, I think, surprise you and do something new.

Readers, we want to hear from you! What books are you turning to right now? Are you team #EscapistReads or team #PandemicReads? Email us at CodeSwitch@npr.org and tell us your thoughts. And stay tuned tomorrow, for another Q&A with one of our favorite authors.

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Colonialism, Eugenics And Downright Terror In 'Mexican Gothic'

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1. How does her cousin's symptoms show signs of mental illness?

2. Is her father an example of how a typical Hispanic household is?

In chapter one you can start to notice that Noemi's' cousin, Catalina, has been  behaving oddly. She had written this crazed letter in which she says  she sees ghosts and her husband is poisoning her, she begs Noemi for help. Noemi and her father were very confused about what was going on. Her father had stopped a previous relationship and then after Catalina and her current husband, Virgil, got married. He has always wondered if he can be trusted. He wanted to go and check on the situation and bring Noemi with him. Catalina seems to have some psychological breaks in which she seems  to not make sense. She also tends to see things that aren't there. Catalina doesn't really leave her house and I'm sure that is making her more impatient and it seems to capture that she is not okay. Mental health would probably be brought up a lot because I feel like these symptoms, in which she thinks people are trying to kill her, can be signs of schizophrenia. In her letter she wrote “I bar my door but still they come, they whisper at nights i am so afraid of these restless dead, these ghosts, fleshless things,” these words sound very weird, she seems to not make too much sense and say a whole bunch of random things. A lot of the things she wrote about in the letter reveal that she isn't stable. A lot of the time people with this mental illness can think that people are out for them and that they are trying to kill them/ hurt them and this reflects with Catalinas behavior.

As you read throughout the chapter you can see how her father can be very demanding and controlling in a way. In chapter one you can see how he is telling her that she cant go to the party and he gives her “solutions” for the excuses she is putting up so that she can go. You can connect the way he is with her to a typical Hispanic household because Hispanic parents tend to be more strict and more “conservative” in a way with their children. From my experience my parents always take a while thinking if i should go somewhere or do certain things. When I was younger they didn't let me do much either. I think that when it comes to this, if your parents say something then you  do it, I think Noemi probably feels that urge as well. As a Latina I can say that there are many things in my household which can feel very controlled. Sometimes it feels like i might not have much of a free will, and from reading the first few chapters it seemed as if Noemi also feels that way.

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What is the relationship between Noemi and her parents?

Does Noemi want to be well-liked by the people around her?

In the novel called “Mexican Gothic,” we follow the character named Noemi Taboada as she goes to see her cousin Catalina as she lives with her husband. Due to her being sick the family suspects that her husband has something to do with this. Noemi’s job is to go to Catalina’s house and figure out what the situation is. As I read the novel I noticed that the family has more of a traditional outlook on how a woman should act and what a woman should do which creates discontent between the parents and Noemi. The novel states “She wanted to pursue a master's degree in anthropology. This would require her to enroll at the National. Her father thought this was both a waste of time and unsuitable…” “Noemi's mother was equally unimpressed by these modern notions of hers. Girls were supposed to follow a simple life cycle, from debutante to wife.” Having these beliefs of what a woman should be doing would cause a strand from the relationship. Often it seems like women have this role to where they are expected to be mothers, wives, and caretakers. These gender roles tend to be carried on from generation to generation because at that time it was deemed as normal or an example of how a woman should behave.

As the story continues we see more of Noemi's interactions and actions with the people around her. When she meets someone new she tends to be polite as one does but over time if someone challenges her on an idea or topic she will not hesitate to speak her mind. "She wanted to be liked. Perhaps this explained the parties, the crystalline laughter, the well-coiffed hair, the rehearsed smile." It seems like Noemi is a people pleaser, always wanting to please others than herself. On the surface, she is independent and strong-willed but deep down she wants to be well-liked by everyone. People who develop these tendencies of not valuing their own desires and news. In the novel, I noticed that Noemi does everything for everyone but she never really took time for herself. I believe that she wants to leave a good impression. For example, when she goes to these social events and even admits this herself, question why she does these things for other people. Maybe she relies on these social events to impress her parents or to have some sort of independence and freedom from her parents or maybe she does this to challenge the idea of what a woman can do or not do because of the values in society during this time.

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1. How does the author make the book seem like it takes place in the 1950’s even though it was written more recently?

2. What effect does it make when the book references something being “old fashioned”?

3. What was the epidemic in 1888 talked about in the book? Was this real?

Even though the book was written more recently and published in 2020, the book takes place in the 1950’s. At first while reading this book, I wasn’t sure what time period this was and almost thought it was more modern day. Then, further into the book I see how the author makes references about the current social norms etc. that seem a bit older than modern day. The author makes many of these references in order to better set the book in the 1950’s. For example when Noemi first mentions her cousin's issues he says “tonight I received a telegram”. Telegrams are sort of an old way to send messages to each other. This was probably one of the biggest hints at telling me that the book didn’t take place in modern times. If it were nowadays, he would’ve received an email or a text. In addition, the references made about a woman having to look for a husband suggest that the book is more dated. “And she was expected to devote her time to the twin pursuits of leisure and husband hunting”. In modern times, a woman's time often isn’t just devoted to finding a husband and having other things of interest. Overall, despite the author writing this book in modern times, they did a good job of making references to the time period in order to set the setting.

When Noemi visits her cousin, there are many comments about things being old fashioned. This creates a sort of eerie effect in the book. For example, Noemi gets picked up and she says “But the vehicle in front of her was dated, dirty and it needed a paint job”. Noemi clearly notices that the car from her cousin's family was old. It is not just the car but there are also many things about the family’s house. “It looked absolutely Victorian in construction, with it’s broken shingles, elaborate ornamentation, and dirty bay windows. She’d never seen anything like it in real life; it was terribly different from her family’s modern house, the apartments of her friends, or the colonial houses with facades of red tezontle.” In this quote it is made clear that the family’s house seems older just like their car.

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Linguist

Why is Virgil's tone  so combative/defensive ?

I think that Virgil is definitely hiding something with his wife's illness. Virgil talks badly of Noemi's father saying, "No, your father wrote about psychiatrists at the first possible opportunity. it's the thing he writes about, over and over again ?" This quote makes me think that he wants to defer from the conversation about Catalina and come off rude and mean so that Noemi would want to leave.

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Linguist

Why does Noemi like to describe everything that she sees?

I think that Noemi takes notes on everything that she sees in the manor because she can already tell that there is something off .Noemi had already had her suspicions on the Dowleys because of the letter that Catalina had written. In the book the first thing that she been told was that there was little to no lighting in the house. She found that weird, when getting ready for dinner noticed that there were no lights in her room. "“In her room, Noemi could not locate a single lamp with a light bulb, though there was a single outlet.”