A book a day: Xavier B. Fernández: Hell and Texas

Year of publication: 2022

Advisable: Alright

Hell and Texas It is a “pulp” pastiche that combines the “western” with horror. One that gives what promises: simple but striking characters, sparkling dialogues, a couple of terrifying passages, some truculent description and a handful of well -narrated action scenes. All this wrapped with an effective and condensed prose in short chapters, which usually close with a “cliffhanger” that encourages us to continue devouring the story.

Xavier B. Fernández’s novel is about a group of varied heroes who unite strength to face the fearsome vampire called Comodoro and his diabolic slender.

All these heroes, from the young and brave Ismael to Valdemar Veracruz, David Bonnechance (nicknamed Blackjack) and Gray Wolf, I liked. Despite being some somewhat flat protagonists they are properly outlined, they overcome charisma and maintain quite nice interactions.

The villains of Hell and Texason the other hand, they have seemed less interesting. And it is that at no time I have come to feel truly threatening (in fact, their defeats, although argumentatively cunning, they are generally quite anti -annual). Of all of them he would rescue, if Betty La Roja, because he has a tremendously effective design (although everything is said, something stereotyped) and is the catalyst of a certain revelation in the climax of the novel.

In addition to the limitations imposed by its humility and their few pretensions, Hell and Texas It has, of course, its defects. Perhaps the main one (even if it goes ahead that at no time comes to break the dive of the reader) is that Ismael’s voice, the narrator, is not always convincing, since at times he speaks with a simplicity that fits him, but others release words that disregard a tad.

Another defect that I see the novel is that it seems little plausible that Blackjack is skeptical of the existence of vampires so late, taking into account that he has already fought against them and that when they had barely mentioned them he had not shown any sign of distrust. But well, Fernández barely stops in this matter, and even justifies it to some extent. And the truth is that I, in a novel like this, do not need too elaborate explanations.