A con artist, an unmarried, middle-aged boardinghouse owner, and the niece she keeps under her thumb become entangled in a web of deceit and seduction in The Intrigue, the tense noir thriller by Silvia Moreno-Garcia (The Bewitching; Silver Nitrate).
The place is Puerco Ahogado, a small town in Veracruz, Mexico, in the 1940s. Ulises ekes out a living bilking lonely women, although he has struggled since the death of his father, who was the brains of their operation. Ulises accepts an invitation to visit a guesthouse run by Perla, an older woman with whom he connected via a lonely hearts ad. Perla shares the run of the guesthouse with Inés, the daughter of her dead sister and a man who vanished long ago. Inés longs for the city, but Perla limits her access to money to keep her at home. Inés catches on to Ulises and offers a deal: she will help Ulises woo her aunt, and they will split her money. But getting Perla to part with cash proves harder than winning her heart, and Perla and Inés are both more capable of deceit than they seem.
Moreno-Garcia nails the essential noir quality of the setting as a character. The claustrophobic feeling of surveillance--particularly over the two women who have lived their lives in that small town and must maintain a standard of "respectability"--heightens the tension and passion in this dangerous triangle. This atmospheric thriller keeps the pressure simmering and restrained until the moment the secrets boil over. --Kristen Allen-Vogel, information services librarian at Dayton Metro Library