Zia Summer

By Rudolfo Anaya

Group Reviews/Comments:

I liked how atmospheric it was. I liked reading about the Spanish/Mexican/Indian culture, and I liked the characters. But the mystery really dragged on. Lots of repetitive descriptions.

I had high expectations of this book. I’m familiar with the location and I like private investigator books-I was expecting this to be fun. But the mystery was just okay. The red herrings were too obvious. There was too much on the history and culture. After a while it just didn’t add much. Had “good bones” but too much “decoration.”

I am familiar with the area, so I was looking forward to this read. I liked that he was a PI, but new to murder investigations. I liked the cultural aspects but it should have been dialed down. Not enough mystery.

I had a hard time getting into this book. The first chapter took me a month! Once there was a murder it got more interesting. Wonderful Chicano literary writer, but not a mystery writer.

I had a hard time getting into it. Not a fan of how it was molded together. Not enough mystery. Characters too obvious, not enough depth to them.

Wordy but well written. Good sense of culture and place. Spanglish was authentic and I appreciated that. So 1990s! Environmentalism felt true to the time. Mystery was not spectacular.

Sense of place was great, but that’s where my interest stopped. I was not surprised by the ending.