Salt Bones by Jennifer Givhan

The cover of Salt Bones shows a figure with dark hair wrapped in a purple cloak beside a body of water reflecting an orange sky.Mulholland
Published July 22, 2025
Reviewed by Barbara Fister

In a community on the edge of the poisoned, environmentally degraded Salton Sea in southern California, daughters have been disappearing. This haunted place is vividly brought to life in a novel that combines a thrilling plot, deeply developed characters, and a poetic evocation of the borderland. It’s a borderland in multiple senses: between Mexican, indigenous, and American heritages, between languages, between horror, thriller, and mystery genres, between everyday reality and the deeper truth of folklore. And it’s very, very good.

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