Dancing with the Tiger

May 30, 2016
Set in Oaxaca, Wright’s (Learning to Float) thrilling debut novel introduces Anna, a woman from the U.S. who, along with several others, pursues the ancient and extremely valuable funerary mask of Montezuma. Seeking to redeem her parents’ research (her father was a discredited art collector), Anna throws herself into the corrupt and dangerous world of their past. She refuses to give up her search, even after she becomes the target of an infamous drug lord. This is not just a tale of filial redemption; it’s a tale of the desire to hide, and to transform into something beyond oneself. “I belong in this place where I do not belong,” Anna thinks. Each flawed character becomes linked in their desperation for a prize that promises another chance at love, pride, piety, or survival. “With that mask I could look God in the face,” the drug lord announces. A deep look at what it means to be masked, Wright’s novel is a worthwhile read for anyone in search of an authentically flawed heroine who learns to remove her own mask in a world where remaining hidden feels like the safest option. Agent Molly Friedrich, Friedrich Literary Agency.

May 1, 2016
An unwieldy cast of bad characters scrambles across Mexico after Montezuma's funerary mask in a thriller with pretensions by memoirist Wright (Learning to Float, 2002). Not that a thriller can't be literary (i.e., Graham Greene, John le Carre), but it requires more than murky philosophizing about the meaning of masks or invocations of Santa Muerte, a Mexican folk saint whose sinister name forecasts the final destination of a good many of these unsavory folks. Among them is Christopher Maddox, the meth-addicted looter who digs up the mask for drug kingpin Reyes but makes the bad mistake of stealing it back. Anna Ramsey, an American who has just ditched her cheating fiance, gets involved when her father hears about the mask from shady Mexican art dealer Lorenzo Gonzales and thinks it will salvage his reputation, cast in doubt by the discovery of forged masks in his collection. Anna, anxious to ensure her father doesn't sink back into the alcoholism that enveloped him after the sudden death of her mother many years ago, reluctantly heads to Mexico to buy the mask, setting off an elaborate chase involving so many people that Wright is reduced to labeling chapters, "The Carver," "The Housekeeper," et al. so readers can keep them straight. The multiplicity of motives and back stories would be confusing enough, but the mask changes hands so many times that it finally becomes ridiculous in a baroque climax involving (among multiple others) a fetishistic collector who likes to have sex with women in masks. Anna is an irritating heroine whose doubts and self-destructive ways are not as interesting as the author thinks. Her attempts to manipulate the creepy collector are both distasteful and pathetically inept; her meant-to-be-redeeming relationship with attractive artist Salvador Flores doesn't make her any more appealing. The level of violence is appalling but hard to take seriously after characters survive being buried in cement and a gunshot to the gut. Well written but seriously undisciplined.

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Starred review from May 1, 2016
A grave robber unearths the death mask of Montezuma and sets in motion a fast-moving story as the artifact changes handsbought, stolen, hidden, and resurrected several times over. The mask itself and all who touch it come to extraordinary ends in this intricately wrought thriller. Clearly written with great care, the novel plumbs the depths of love and obsession in complex yet delicately woven themes. Santa Muerte, a female folk saint, is pitted against the Virgin Mary in a country still held in the thrall of its ancient cultures. The art collectors are as brutal as drug lords. In fact, some of them are drug lords. Despite the violence, the seductive charms of Mexico shine brightly and flash from the pages in yellows and golds. Anna Ramsey needs to obtain the mask to repair her father's damaged reputation in the art world. Fueled by hora feliz (happy hour) mescal and margaritas, she confronts the demons of her past and manages to unmask her true self. The fictional Anna is filled with as much self-doubt and need for emotional connection as the author was in her earlier work, the autobiographical Learning to Float (2002). But this time the journey of self-discovery is set within a powerful story full of danger and pathos that will appeal to fans of Megan Abbott, Denise Mina, and Minette Walters.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2016, American Library Association.)

February 1, 2016

When a meth-addicted grave robber digs up the death mask of Montezuma, who will claim it? The drug lord for whom he works? A shadowy American expat collector? A two-faced antiquities curator? Or maybe troubled Anna Ramsey, who wants the mask to redeem her father's reputation. Journalist Wright's first novel (after the memoir Learning To Float) is getting considerable library promotion.

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