In an essay for the Los Angeles Times in September, Silvia Moreno-Garcia cheerfully explored the perils of her work as a novelist, starting with her name. “Once someone told me if I wanted to make it as a writer I needed a shorter name,” she wrote. Then there is the body of her work, which includes sword-and-sorcery novellas, a coming-of-age noir set in northern Mexico and a horror novel. Is Moreno-Garcia a fantasy, historical or crime author? “As you can see, I give people headaches.” The award-winning Moreno-Garcia — born and raised in northern Mexico to parents who were “hoarders in many ways, avid readers who didn’t care what shelf something sat on” — comes to Eugene in support of her latest work, The Daughter of Doctor Moreau, which is set in 19th-century Yucatán. In 2020, Moreno-Garcia came into national prominence with Mexican Gothic, which made the bestseller list of The New York Times. She followed that up in 2021 with the novel Velvet Was the Night, a gritty look at Mexico’s Dirty War set in 1971. Moreno-Garcia lives in Vancouver, British Columbia. She is the publisher for Innsmouth Free Press and sometimes book columnist for The Washington Post.
Silvia Moreno-Garcia, author and editor, speaks and will sign books 2 pm Sunday, Nov. 6, at the Eugene Public Library in support of Lane Art Council’s Fiesta Cultural. The event is FREE.