David Keaton's Reviews > Zero Saints

A ferocious book, and I learned some new words, too! Gabino Iglesias' new novel is full of Spanish thought bubbles and slang and asides that are expertly rationed and don't confuse at all. Kind of like what Burgess did in A Clockwork Orange, maybe more like what Cypress Hill did on their Greatest Hits, but twice as murderous as either. Context more than gets you through the language Chimera, and the author's strategy pays off big time, highlighting the dangerous, otherworldly beauty of the borderlands, especially Iglesias' blood-red Mexico, "un monstruo," which eats the unwary like popcorn, sometimes fingers first. Violent as hell. Sad, too. I devoured it fast, before it ate me instead.