Silvia Moreno-Garcia’s Mexican Gothic has all the hallmarks of classic gothic literature—a beautiful young woman in peril, an ancient, crumbling mansion, a family consumed by sordid, murderous secrets, an imperious, controlling family matriarch, a handsome but coldly calculating villain, and a pallid young man who may or may not step up and do the right thing.

Moreno-Garcia may be playing in the gothic sandbox, but she’s not interested in using the same old toys. Instead of windswept English moors and white cliffs above crashing waves, she sets her novel in the lush, humid Mexico of the 1950s.

Noemi, Mexican Gothic’s heroine, is no shy shrinking violet. She may be young, but she’s smart, inquisitive, well-educated, stylish and confident. After a brief beginning in glittering, cosmopolitan Mexico City, Noemi is dispatched by her father to a small mountain mining town deep in rural Mexico. They’ve received a disturbing letter from Noemi’s cousin, who was swept away to the mining town after marrying a mysterious Englishman.

I won’t spoil for you the delights of what follows, but be prepared—this is a pure gothic horror thrill ride that will keep you awake and reading long past your bedtime.

Moreno-Garcia writes like a dream, or in this case a fever dream. Her powers of description and language use are formidable and her imagination is wildly unfettered. Mexican Gothic veers from traditional gothic to gothic horror to a kind of cosmic horror drenched in decay and rot. No matter how wild the story gets, and believe me when I tell you it gets truly wild, it never goes off the rails. Moreno-Garcia is always firmly in control of her art.

I live in a suburban Cape Cod rather than a creepy jungle mansion, but Mexican Gothic had me searching the dark corners of my home for suspicious signs of possibly sentient mold. I can’t think of higher praise.