Review: Moon Child by Gaby Triana

Thank you, Gaby Triana, for the eARC of Moon Child in exchange for an honest review. All thoughts and opinions are my own.

From the first time I saw the cover of Moon Child on Twitter, I was intrigued. When I read the description of The Craft meets The Shining, I was sold. When the opportunity came up to be able to review Moonchild, I jumped at the chance and I'm so glad I did.

Moonchild, is the story of Valentina Callejas, known to family and friends as Vale, and her struggles to free herself from her strict matriarchal Catholic upbringing, while embracing her growing connection to the occult. In a move shocking to even Vale herself, she abandons her yearly Catholic youth camp stay, and returns home to face her mother and grandmother's anger and concern. Tired of their controlling nature, their aversion to her growing interest in the occult, and the secrets they keep regarding her father's death, Vale turns to the only other person she can trust, her illegitimate half-sister, Macy.

At Macy's home in Central Florida, Vale finds peace and freedom to explore her growing psychic powers. One night, she is visited by a wolf and led through the woods to the derelict Sunlake Springs Resort, where she finds four young clairvoyant squatters who claim that they have been awaiting her arrival to complete their circle.

As she jumps into learning about her psychic powers, she is subject to terrible sights and experiences, as well as threats from one of the Clairs she is seeking to help. She in a fight to learn the truth about her father and his mysterious death, the truth of what the Clairs are seeking from Sunlake Springs Resort, and in the end, what Sunlake Springs Resorts wants from them.

Right off the bat, I am a sucker for Southern Gothic horror, and Gaby knows her stuff.  I live close to the area where the novel is set in Central Florida and she 100% has her descriptions of the weather and appearance of the areas around Vale and her friends down.

One of the main aspects of Moon Child that I loved was the amount of representation in it. The main character and her immediate family are Latinx, her half-sister is also a woman of color, and there is LGBTQIA representation within the group of Clairs. I hope more books take Moonchild as an example of how to make their books more inclusive.

 The story has a slow growing sense of dread and the tension is palpable right up to the very last page.  I was hooked from page 1 and finished in one sitting because I had to know how it ended. 

5/5 Stars