I have not read all of the works of Silvia Moreno- Garcia, but those that I have read have been favorites of mine. (Certain Dark Things, Gods of Jade and Shadow, Velvet Was the Night). Even though her books are NEVER the same, each of the three books that I have read so far has ended up being a favorite of mine. Now, with Signal to Noise, I can count that as FOUR favorites. This book was absolutely fantastic. Told in two timelines of 1988 and 2009, Signal to Noise is the story of Meche, a fifteen girl who learned to cast magic spells using vinyl records in 1988 and who is returning to Mexico City two decades later as a grown woman for her father’s funeral. During this return trip, Meche is forced to confront her broken friendships with Daniela and Sebastian, both of whom meant a great deal to her in 1988, but with whom she had a falling out in 1989.

This novel has music, magic, love, friendship, family, and a bit of nostalgia. Basically, there is a little bit of everything that I love in a book. I could not love this one more!

Personal rating:
4.25🌟, rounded to 4🌟


Favourite quote:
“The only problem is I don't stitch spells anymore.”
“Why not?”
“I hurt people, once.”
“Did they deserve to be hurt?”
Grandmother touched Meche's chin. “Don't they always, when you're a girl?”


This is surprisingly good? I'll be honest, when I first started the story, I was already slightly irritated because the formatting went to crap when I opened the PDF file on my Kindle. Not blaming anyone, just an unfortunate thing is what it is.

Still, despite that, I found myself very much enjoying the story. Even when Meche's being a music snob, I barely minded her endless music references, which is wild to me 😌

Plus, we were only given glimpses of the dad but he still managed to make my heart ache?? My feelings remain to be quite complicated when it comes to that sad, miserable man, which I'm sure is exactly what Meche (and maybe even her mom) feels towards him. Kudos to the author for succeeding in making me feel this way.

I do feel the ending is slightly too easy for my liking, though, which ended up impacting my enjoyment of the entire story. Reminds me all over again that endings do affect you quite a lot, seeing as they serve as stories' conclusions and all.

I still had a great time overall, can't wait to read more from Silvia Moreno-Garcia. She's on the fast track to becoming my new favourite author 💖

I love Silvia Moreno-García's writing, and it was no different in Signal to Noise. Everything felt so lyrical, so perfectly described, that it's like you're inside the story watching as everything unfolds. I did have an issue with it but let's start with what I loved first.

The Good
- While the summary does talk about magic, the book doesn't focus on that aspect as much. Since the timeline is divided in the past & the present, I think the present showed that sometimes mundane things can have magic of their own and I liked that.
- Daniela is an absolute sweetheart and she deserves the world
- Sebastián is so cool and he also deserves better
-With all of the songs mentioned in the book a playlist can easily be created and they're all bops
- Like I said before, SMG is something else when it comes to writing. I haven't read a book of hers that I didn't like

The Bad
- Meche, that's it.

It's hard when the only bad thing in a book is the main character, but Meche was just plain awful. Look, I love unhinged and unlikeable women in stories, yet there was something about Meche that I just couldn't stand. It felt like everyone grew up except her. She held a grudge against her friends over something that they truly saved her from because it was dangerous, and she held on to that anger for years. It's hard to love a character when they don't evolve in any shape or form. She sort of got better near the end but I couldn't root for her.

I'm still giving it four stars because the story is really good and it was easy to get past Meche's tantrums when the story offered other POVs.

This is a republished edition of her debut book and it is a work of music, magic, and love that shines. Set across dual timelines in Mexico City it is a fantasy, a love story and ax coming of age story rolled into a single beautiful book.

The characters are complex, flawed and totally relatable. The story is a tribute to great musicians and songwriters and of course Mexico in all it’s complex, strange and wondrous beauty.

There are no major occurrences or plot twists, but once again she delivers a story that is powerful in its own right.

An incredible read, well written with a captivating storyline, well developed characters and nostalgia aplenty. I really loved it,

Childhood friends to lovers. Second chance romance. Found family. Flashback scenes. Magic, music, and morally grey main characters. I love this book so much.

Silvia Moreno-Garcia did it again. She makes me fall in love with her stories every time I open one of her books, and even though this one is a bit different from what I have read from her before, it was no exception. The story is filled with music, magic and love. Sometimes these interwine and this mix creates and transforms everything we will be reading. Meche was such a complex character, I could relate to her on ocasions, and there were moments where I just wished I could talk her out of many things. The story does not have major plot-twists or great/grandiose revelations but it does not mean that it won't make you feel things, and that is very powerful.

This story, with its many layers of significance, deeply felt emotions, and real life characters felt so relatable to me that I felt spoken to in a soul level.

One of my favorites by an author that writes profound books.

Really fun book about adolescent love in every frustrating aspect of it. This novel is filled with magic, love,. and friendship like no other.

Silvia Moreno-Garcia's stories have yet to disappoint me! I love how effortlessly she is able to include Mexican culture into everything she writes. I did find the main character is this pretty stubborn but other than that, I loved the friendships, the magic, and the music elements.

Moreno- Garcia blows my mind with how her books are all so different from eachother but are always absolutely fantastic, this is my fifth book by her and she hasn't let me down yet!
Signal to Noise is a nostalgic coming-of-age story focusing on three friends who discover the power of magic through music. Ringleader Meche is overbearing and prickly but that makes her softer moments even more tender and I especially felt that in her relationship with her grandmother. Infact for someone that could come across as wholly unlikeable I really felt for Meche, both in the 80s and as an adult. I liked how this story could have just been about magic but was balanced beautifully by exploring friendship families and growing up.

Thank you Netgalley and Rebellion Publishing for providing me with a free digital copy in exchange for an honest review

Io amo Silvia Moreno Garcia, e mi piace il suo muoversi fra diversi generi sempre con un occhio alla tradizione e uno all'innovazione. Mi intrigava l'idea di una magia realizzata attraverso la musica, anche se non avevo idea di come l'avrebbe sviluppata: e la storia alla fine è quella eterna degli adolescenti, delle loro famiglie, delle loro amicizie, dei loro desideri - e di come non vedano che tutto ha un costo, che sia magia o meno. Intelligente, credibile (anche e soprattutto nel mettere in scena una protagonista profondamente antipatica - e che no, dopo vent'anni non è migliorata...), si fa leggere come sempre con vero piacere.

I recently fell in love with Silvia Moreno-Garcia and her writing after completing Velvet Was The Night and The Daughter of Doctor Moreau and when I saw the rerelease of Signal To Noise I jumped to read it. Overall Garcia’s strengths show: deep characters, strong world building but I did not love this book like I did her others.

While the characters were deep, I never cared for them and I even disliked them especially Mercedes and Sebastian. I know they are teenagers throughout the book but they felt like brats. I did feel sympathy over Mercedes parents but the rest of the book, even as an adult, she felt cold, angry and bitter. That was the problem because I never wanted them to succeed, I wanted them to change.

Overall Signal To Noise was not in my favorite books by Silvia Moreno-Garcia but I do look forward to reading her other books!

Silvia is my favorite forever, I would read literally anything she pens. I love this witchy story of misfits figuring out friendship, love, and sorcery. I love her main characters. They’re never sugar sweet and so refreshing. Also the music on this book? 👌🏻👌🏻👌🏻

It's hard to know how to classify Signal to Noise, so in the end I have settled on "Fiction/Magical Realism". One thing I enjoy about reading Silvia Moreno-Garcia's works is that every one of them is different, and with each new book you don't know quite what to expect. Signal to Noise is her earliest work, but one I am only getting to off the back of reading several more recent tales. It has a quiet start, initially seeming mostly to be a drama about family and friendship and wounds from the past, before the magical realism elements start to come in, making you wonder if the events that took place were real or just imagination. Interestingly, I read this shortly after watching the musical K-drama The Sound of Magic, and that series featured a few similar ideas. The theme of music running through Signal to Noise is a delight and ties everything together so well. By the quarter mark I was fully immersed in the action and keen to see how the story would progress, and my interest held until the finale--an ending which I found satisfying. If you liked any of Silvia Moreno-Garcia's other books, you will certainly like this one, and if you are new to her writing, Signal to Noise would be a decent place to start. It gets 4.5 stars from me.

(My review will go live on my blog at the link provided below on 30 August, closer to release date for the title. At that time I will also share on Goodreads and across social media.)

I introduced Silvia Moreno Garcia's books to my students recently and they fell in love. This new title - a reprint of SMG's first ever title - is the ultimate slice of nostalgia pie.

This ARC was provided to me via Kindle, from Rebellion and #NetGalley. Thank you for the opportunity to preview and review. Opinions expressed are completely my own.

Wonderful characters, a plot that’s amazing.

I love literally everything Silvia Moreno Garcia writes and this is no exception. I love the characters amd the plot and the setting and how much feeling SMG puts into the story without overwriting it. 5 stars.

Woah! Being able to read Silvia Moreno-Garcia debut re-edition novel was amazing.

Signal To Noise is a wonderful coming of age story.
Meche, Sebastian and Daniela are so well written.
I loved following Meche's story. She felt so relatable and real.
The dual timelines - 1989 and 2009 was pretty neat.
I loved the pop culture references. Even though I was born in 89 I thought it was pretty cool hearing and reading about the music back then.
The details of character, dialogue and setting are some of the best.
If you enjoy a great coming of age story and some good music you'll love this novel!

“I voluntarily read and reviewed an advanced copy of this book. All thoughts and opinions are my own.”

Rebellion|Solaris,
Thank You for your generosity and gifting me a copy of this amazing eARC!

Reviewing the reprint from Solaris, which I received as an e-arc via Netgalley. There may be changes between what I read and what is finally published; I hope one of them is to fix the vocabulary error "hierophants" for "sycophants," and another is to remove the numerous coordinate commas between non-coordinate adjectives. Otherwise, apart from the odd slightly off turn of phrase that is probably because the author is not writing in her native language, the writing is highly capable.

I've read a couple of Moreno-Garcia books that I very much loved (The Beautiful Ones and Gods of Jade and Shadow), and one that didn't work for me and that I abandoned partway through (Mexican Gothic). The ones I loved pulled off the move I call the Glorious Ending, where things seem to be going inevitably downhill, because people, but then someone does a truly loving and wise thing and turns the looming tragedy into triumph. The one I didn't love was, I think, the wrong genre for me (the Gothic novel). I found this one closer, unfortunately, to Mexican Gothic than to the other two; it's an 80s-nostalgia book, a very-into-music book, a coming-of-age novel, and features a protagonist who is dealing with her pain by shoving it onto other people, none of which endeared it to me. I did finish it, though.

I grew up in the 80s, though I'm about seven years older than the main characters in this book; they're 15 and at high school in 1989, and I was in my last year at university by then. I wasn't into pop culture, and certainly not popular music, in the 80s, either, which makes me an atypical 80s kid and also means that 80s nostalgia properties don't connect with me all that well. A lot of the music referenced here is in Spanish, as well, since the story is set in Mexico City, and I don't have a frame of reference for it at all. I know some of the better-known English-language songs, like "A Whiter Shade of Pale," but the thing about very-into-music books is that the things that are so evocative for the characters don't necessarily translate for the reader unless that reader is also into the same music and in the same way. The title of a song is just a series of words if you don't have any emotional or cultural context for it, and because the music is so central to the main character, it carries a lot of meaning for her - but little or none for me.

The evocation of the setting is otherwise rich and powerful, I assume because the author is writing from her own experience. There's a decent amount of skill shown, too, in the dual timeline, 1989 and 2009, in the same setting with some of the same characters; a young woman who has escaped from Mexico City to work in Europe as a computer programmer comes back for her father's funeral and has to face up to what happened 20 years before, including a betrayal that is teased for some time before being revealed, which makes sense out of so much of what has gone before.

Unfortunately, though, I didn't get from this book the full Glorious Ending that I got from a couple of the author's later works. The ending is slightly more hopeful than everything preceding it has necessarily prepared the reader for, but only slightly, and I can't help cynically wondering if the relationship that's tentatively (re)formed at the end is doomed by the fact that, honestly, the main character is not well equipped for loving relationships by either nature or nurture.

These are alienated characters who are mostly dealing badly with the disappointments of life (with the exception of the female best friend, Daniela, who, while a bit spineless, genuinely enjoys a relatively conventional life and finds fulfilment in it), and who are, as teenagers, striving earnestly for outcomes that would not actually make them happy and are a bad idea, by means that will cost them more than they realize. As a matter of personal taste, I don't enjoy following such characters, and that's reflected in my low rating for the book.

This is one of those cases where the execution is good, but the book is just not for me.