I received an advance reader’s copy (ARC) of Bochica by Carolina Flórez-Cerchiaro. Since this version is just a proof and not the final version, I won’t quote directly and will keep my comments general.

In Bochica by Carolina Flórez-Cerchiaro, Antonia spent her formative years in La Casona, a grand house in Columbia built by her parents near a waterfall. But after her mother dies by falling off that cliff, and her father nearly goes mad with grief and sets the house ablaze, they leave. Now, several years later, Antonia and her father are going back. La Casona has been repaired and turned into a luxurious hotel. Being back here, however, brings back memories Antonia has been avoiding, and with those memories come doubts. What really happened here to her mother? When she finds diary entries written by her mother, Antonia is even more alarmed. The truth seems buried in La Casona, but so do dangers, ones that Antonia might not be able to escape from.

This is going to be a hard review to write, because while I liked some elements, so much of this book fell flat.

Firstly, the concept and premise of this story is so solid. I love historical fantasy, and with the seemingly supernatural elements promised in the description, plus my fondness for books like Rebecca (set at a similar time, in a grand estate, with a mysterious death) I was primed to really like this. However, I feel like the potential of this story was never achieved, and that’s quite disappointing.

I liked the protagonist Antonia, an intelligent young woman who’s hurting and desperately wants answers about her mother’s death, but I also think that most of her feelings are conveyed through internal monologuing rather than demonstrated through her actions or spoken words. So a lot of her emotions weren’t very interesting to read. And honestly, the other characters barely made an impression on me, even her love interest (to me, the romance felt like an afterthought).

The setting of La Casona was really cool. Who doesn’t like a giant fancy house/hotel as the backdrop for a murder mystery? But I wanted to spend more time here, and on the grounds, and really allow the setting to shine, since clearly there’s something to it. Bochica, a goddess as far as I can understand, obviously had something to do with this location, but the significance of both was pretty much lost on me. I didn’t really understand what she had to do with this, or who she was, which is not good, since her name is the book’s title.

Also, nothing was particularly scary, or even creepy. The svetyba, a sort of ghost creature, is supposed to be frightening, and certainly had potential to be. A dark figure following and watching Antonia is definitely eerie, but nothing felt tangibly unsettling or dangerous like it was supposed to be. This made any possible tension in the story feel distant, so I wasn’t that invested in the story beyond mild curiosity.

And on a more minor note, I had a hard time figuring out when this story was supposed to be set using context clues. It’s the 1930s, I know that from the book description and written dates in the story—but it doesn’t sound like the 1930s. The dialogue seems far too modern (Antonia thinks the phrase “press pause” which surely did not exist in that era) and often took me out of the narrative. Granted, this is an ARC, so things might change, but that would require a lot of little tweaks to give the dialogue—and even in internal monologues—a less modern sound. 

Furthermore, Antonia’s worldview feels a little incongruous. That isn’t to say that a woman in her time can’t be what we’d call today a feminist, determined to make her own way in the world and break down barriers and question gender roles. I know there were women like that; there always have been. It’s simply that how she’s presented sounds kind of artificial or unrealistic for the time period, perhaps due to my feelings about the anachronistic dialogue. It’s like how Belle vs. the townsfolk is written in Disney’s live action Beauty and the Beast. That dynamic might have existed back then, but it’s presented in such an on-the-nose way, dripping with modern sensibilities and phrases, that it feels fake. I’m surprised no one described Antonia being “ahead of her time” like Belle, despite the speaker having no idea how the course of history will play out for women’s rights.

In the end, Bochica is a tale I really wanted to like but didn’t quite manage to. Nearly everything was kind of lackluster for me, which is a real shame. Antonia’s not a bad protagonist, and the setting and magical elements seem cool, but I feel like it’s just all wasted potential. I wanted more out of this: more creepiness, more lore, more character work. I didn’t dislike it, but I also didn’t really like it. I hope that Flórez-Cerchiaro publishes more books, because she has a lot of potential and I wish her the best; I just think this book wasn’t quite ready in the form it’s in now.

Bochica is available now!