Rooted

by Leopoldo Gout

Author of Piñata, Leopoldo Goût's latest horror novel Rooted is a "a blood reckoning" (Marlon James) where one woman's return to Mexico City digs away the layers of her forgotten past and the Aztec gods she awakened.

There’s nothing wrong with Aurora.

A successful art lawyer, she has returned to Mexico to celebrate a recent campaign for the repatriation of stolen artifacts―in particular a mysterious statue of an Aztec god, The Flayed One.

But Mexico City isn’t as she remembered. Nothing is. Elements of her past hint at darkness and power, and reality begins to crack and warp the streets.

There’s nothing wrong with Aurora.

As Aurora’s sanity unravels, she must pry apart her family’s secrets and accept the simplest of The Flayed One cannot stay buried.

“It wields all the destructive fury of a flayed god determined to avenge centuries’ worth of colonial devastation and greed...”–Cynthia Gómez, Ignyte-nominated author of Muñeca

Other Books by Leopoldo Goût
Piñata

Genres: Horror, Mythology, Fiction, Fantasy, Thriller, Adult, Horror Thriller

288 pages, Hardcover

First published September 15, 2026

About the author

Leopoldo Gout, author of Genius, is a writer, artist, and filmmaker who hails from Mexico. After studying in London, Gout produced the award-winning film Days of Grace, which A. O. Scott of the New York Times called “potent and vigorous.” He is the executive producer of the number one new show of the summer, sci-fi drama Zoo on CBS and is partnered with James Patterson Entertainment to produce Maximum Ride. Leopoldo Gout resides in New York City with his wife and two children.

Reviews

[Lauren · Rating 2 out of 5]

Thank you to Tor Nightfire for the ARC. After such a fun prologue, I expected more. The Aztec history and mythology were super interesting, but for a book on the relatively shorter side, this was way too boring. Just not for me.

[Matty · Rating 5 out of 5]

I was a huge fan of piñata 2023, so I was super excited to read a new novel by Leopoldo Gout. Rooted is a beautifully strange and unsettling blend of folk horror, family secrets, ancient mythology, and supernatural terror set primarily in Mexico City.

What I especially liked was the way Gout connects the horror in the main characters family history to the buried history of Mexico itself. The supernatural elements are connected to themes of memory, identity, ancestry, death, and rebirth. The imagery surrounding Xipe Totec and the ghost pipes are particularly disturbing and memorable, may be a bit intense for some people.

The ending is unusual and more symbolic than straightforward, but I thought that was perfect for the story. Rooted isn’t simply a story about defeating a monster; it’s about confronting the things that have been buried and realizing that the past has a way of growing back. I absolutely loved this novel, can’t wait for his next.

⭐️ ⭐️ ⭐️ ⭐️ ⭐️

[Irene Well Worth A Read · Rating 2 out of 5]

A quick review of what felt like a very long book for me.

Aurora has been away from Mexico for quite some time, so maybe it's not that unusual that things are markedly changed from her memories. But how can she have memories from before she was born? What mysterious illness is her mother suffering? And is she having some sort of breakdown, or are these dreams and hallucinations real?

I loved the prologue, but it gave away most of the plot.

"Mothers always hide things from their children. It's what we do. We carry burdens so our children don't have to."

History, folklore, body horror, mystery, it's all here if you can wait it out. The pace is very slow. I don't mean slow burn horror; I mean slow as molasses, especially compared to the prologue, which pulled me in right away. I wanted to love this as much as the author's previous book, Pinata, but it was just an ok read for me.

My thanks to Tor Nightfire for the paperback.

[Kaitie Reads · Rating 4 out of 5]

💀 Aztec Mythology
🍄 Supernatural Horror
💀 Cursed Artifacts
🍄 Family Secrets
💀 Botanical Imagery

This was such an unsettling book! I loved the slow-burn balance of Aztec Mythology, cursed artifacts, anti-colonial rage, and botanical imagery throughout this story, which follows a young woman who returns home to Mexico.

•

Aurora, an art lawyer, returns to Mexico to celebrate the repatriation of stolen artifacts and help integrate them into a local museum's collection. However, Mexico is suffering from a major drought, and she can feel her head spinning quickly after arriving with the altered memories of her childhood home and the nightmares that plague her. A story about the hidden costs of colonialism, loss of culture, and the apparitions of deities who will seek their vengeance.

•

This book was SCAWY. Like, the nightmares our girl Aurora has? Terrifying. Her memories? Also terrifying. Ghost pipe popping up in the streets of Mexico and under the skin of passersby? Terrifying. This had a blend of body horror, botanical horror and supernatural horror that absolutely delivered. While it is a slow burn, I was completely invested in figuring out what is going on and also ridiculously unsettled by the statue of Xipe Totec (PUT THAT THING BACK WHERE IT CAME FROM OR SO HELP ME). Aurora also self-medicates with psilocybin, which was a really interesting part of the plotline and also lends to the idea that part of her reality is a hallucination. The scene setting and especially the horror elements are viscerally described; it's fantastic.

I did find some of the plot omissions and character omissions... frustrating. It works to serve the plot; however, it felt like some plot lines were a little stretched out but ultimately felt incomplete. There is definitely a battle between propriety and modern values VS the natural order and loss of culture, and these things plague Aurora as much as her vivid nightmares. I found the ending to be quite fast-paced compared to the slow-burn beginning and middle, making it feel a little discombobulated.

Overall, this was a fantastic read. I could not read it at night, so it took me longer than anticipated. I thought it was vivid and descriptive, and I loved how the story is Rooted in Aztec Mythology.

•

Thank you to Tor Publishing Group for the ARC of this book. All thoughts and feedback contained within this review are my own.

[domsbookden · Rating 4.5 out of 5]

Rooted does so many things I like well: it has a stellar opening, it executes a rather typical premise in a unique way, it incorporates culture-specific mythology and lore, and it maintains a good balance between horrific imagery and an emotionally aware narrative.

The prologue was fantastic. It read like a standalone short story, but is eventually referenced back to later in the novel. Despite its fairly short page count, it is undoubtedly a slow burn, with most of the story is spend building up a multiple threads that all come together nicely. The mix of cultural artifacts lore, Indigenous Mexican mythology, climate fiction, botanical magical realism, and multigenerational trauma made for a dynamic narrative where each aspect feed into another. It has a lot going on, and I can see how that plus the slower pacing could negatively affect the overall enjoyment of the story, but I really worked for me.

I was not expecting the heavy botanical elements, but I loved the way they were handled in the story. It reminded me of what I was expecting from Overgrowth by Mira Grant, but the execution was actually successful here, in my opinion.

The body horror in Rooted is so well done! It did just enough for me to recoil at the imagery my brain conjured up without tipping over into gross-for-the-sake-of-it territory. Alongside this was a touching story of a struggling woman and her relationships with her mother and grandmother. I personally identified (maybe a little too much) with Aurora's mental state and anxiety for the majority of the novel; her "If you don’t look. It won’t be there. It’s not real until you see it." mantra was way too real for me.

While I really enjoyed Rooted, the writing held it back a bit. There were moments of great, poetic writing, but I do think there is room for improvement regarding diction and syntax. Certain words, phrases, similes, and metaphors were repeated enough for me to notice, and there's no way for me to know if it was done purposefully (which I doubt) or if it's a classic example of repetitive writing. I had this critique for Goût's Piñata, but it seemed to be more pronounced in this release to me.

Still, I found Rooted to be an imaginative horror novel that is equal parts magical, mythical, and monstrous with a heartfelt story about family and sacrifice at its center.

I recommend Rooted to readers who enjoyed The Flayed Man by Chloe Lauter and Odessa by Gabrielle Sher.

[Niniane · Rating 4 out of 5]

I loved this book. The blend of supernatural elements and Aztec mythology was so interesting.

As you know, I love horror with purpose. With meaning. Not when a book throws shocking after shocking element at you just for the sake of being gross. Here, the story had it all. It was truly layered, tackling inheritance, culture, erasure, roots (both literal and metaphorical), parental love, generational burdens...

Yes, it is slow-paced but it worked for me because I wanted to know the truth. It was truly worth it.

Yes, the characters were a bit bland. But to me, the story ad the themes were more than enough.

[CarlysGrowingTBR · Rating 5 out of 5]

📚 Book Review 📚
Thank you @tornightfire for the gifted copy.

Title: Rooted
Author: Leopoldo Goût
Genre: Horror
Pub date: September 15, 2026

✨ Synopsis✨
One woman's return to Mexico City digs away the layers of her forgotten past and the Aztec gods she awakened.

✨ My Thoughts ✨
What a wild ride! After the amazing novel that piñata was, I expected so much from this and it totally delivered. Ancient Aztec gods is becoming one of my favorite things to read about in books.

Any book that definitely makes me want to turn around and start doing research and critically thinking is an automatic slam dunk for me. Every time I read a book by this author I find the need to go research even more of my history from Mexico and I love that!!

I absolutely loved the storyline and the way that it was woven into Aztec mythology and folklore. I thought that the prologue and epilogue were really well done and added a lot to the story and I highly recommend not skipping them if you're one of those people that does.

I will definitely continue to read everything this author writes.

✨ Read if You Vibe With ✨
•Ancient Aztec Gods
•Mexico setting
•Family Secrets
~~~~~~~~~

✨ Have you read any books with Aztec gods??

~~~~~~~~~
🏷️
#bookreviews #bookreviewer #bookstagram #rooted #leopoldogout #horrorbook

[Meg · Rating 5 out of 5]

Aurora has dedicated her career to her dream of repatriating artifacts stolen from her native Mexico. She hasn't been back to Mexico City since her father's death when she was six, but the opportunity to return a precious piece of history brings her back. Her whole life, Aurora has been haunted by visions and dreams; while growing up in Texas and at school in Spain she's kept them at bay with therapy and medication, but back in her childhood home, they permeate her consciousness. When she and her ex-boyfriend uncover a chilling artifact, Aurora's dreams start to feel more like memories that she is sure cannot belong to her.

Rooted was fascinating and on the edge of the level of level of horror I can typically handle. It's a blend of body horror and psychological horror, and I don't recommend reading it close to bedtime, as it might infiltrate your dreams as well. Leopoldo Goût incorporates elements of Aztec religion alongside climate and colonial terror, making an engaging, creative, and compelling novel. I was fully invested in the mystery haunting Aurora and how it connected to the God of Death. While I cannot go into more details because of spoilers, I can say that I highly recommend this to anyone who enjoys the types of horror I've described.

The audiobook is narrated by Krysta Gonzales, and I loved listening to the story... I just recommend switching to something else right before bed. Don't say I didn't warn you.

Thank you to MacMillan Audio and Tor Nightfire for an ALC and eARC. Rooted is out 9/15/2026.

[Matt M · Rating 5 out of 5]

This was my first time reading a book by Leopoldo Gout. His latest, Rooted, is a novel that blends folk horror, body horror, lots of psychological horror, with beautiful writing. I loved the main character, Aurora, and her relationship with her mother and her grandmother.

We see most of the novel filtered through Aurora’s point of view, with the exception of the fantastic prologue, which sets a brutal tone. If you’re not IN with this book after the prologue I don’t know what to tell you.

Gout examines the relationship between the land and its people and the harms of keeping secrets. I want to read more about The Flayed One and his role in Aztec folklore after reading this book.

If you’ve read this one, what did you think?

Thank you to Tor Nightfire for a gifted copy for review!

[Kirk · Rating 5 out of 5]

Rooted by Leopoldo Goût is all about family and roots. There are scenes from this book that grossed me out and horrified me. I couldn’t believe the twist as I never even thought it could happen but happen it does. I want everyone to read it so I have someone to talk about it with. Restoration of Aztec statues is just the beginning. Krysta Gonzales rocked it as the narrator. I’m going to have to rate this 5 stars because it got under my skin. Winky face! ALC was provided by Spotify Audiobooks via NetGalley. I received an audiobook listening copy for free and I am leaving this feedback voluntarily.

[The Blog Without a Face · Rating 3.75 out of 5]

It’s Just the Dry Air, Mija

TL;DR: Rooted starts as a cursed-statue novel and turns into something stranger and sadder: a mother, a daughter, and a sinking city that refuses to forget. Goût thinks like a sculptor, building every scare from one unshakable image. The prose wobbles. The pictures never do. Ghost pipe through cracked pavement will follow you home. Horror with dirt under its nails.

Mexico City is going down twenty feet a century, and the one thing in the middle of it that won’t go down with the rest is the temple the Spanish pulled apart and used for parts. A tour guide says so through a tinny little speaker hanging off his shoulder, about a third of the way into Rooted. Give it fifty years, he says, and the kids on this tour will be looking up at it. He calls it the Aztecs’ last laugh and walks his group off toward the next thing.

Leopoldo Goût stays at the railing. He stays there for the better part of three hundred pages, and it is a hell of a place to stand.

Here is what I wanted from this book. I wanted a cursed statue. I’m weak for a cursed statue the way I’m weak for a Waffle House at two in the morning: I know what it’s going to do to me and I pull in anyway. And the statue is here and it’s a beauty. Xipe Totec, Our Lord the Flayed One, a smiling young man wearing an older man’s skin like a rain poncho, the dead man’s hands dangling loose at his wrists. We meet it first in Spain in the 1840s, in the drawing room of a rich failure who does a bit for his dinner guests where he kneels in front of it and begs it for an ear of corn. His wife is down the hall with a sick baby, and she has started to hear the thing talk. That prologue runs maybe ten pages, it’s the most controlled writing in the novel, and its last image can go fuck itself. I mean that as praise.

Then the present day. The statue comes home from Madrid sealed inside an iron box that nobody in going on two centuries thought to open, with paperwork that describes the box and says not one word about the contents. Aurora Marino, the art lawyer who spent months fighting to get it repatriated, is alone with it under the fluorescents in Room 237 when something inside knocks.

So I got my statue. What I did not see coming is that the statue is the opening act. The headliner is a woman pushing seventy, coughing in the next room and telling her daughter it’s the dry air.

Aurora hasn’t set foot in Mexico City since she was small, since her father died on the living room floor a few feet from the couch where she slept. Now she’s staying in that apartment with her mother, Maria, and it’s the same couch. There’s a corner of that room she will not look at. A grown woman with a law degree, walking to the bathroom at night with her eyes nailed to the ceiling. If you can’t see it, it’s not there. I ran that exact policy until I was eleven on the gap between my closet door and the frame, and I’ve never seen it set down this precisely, the way a kid’s terror comes with bylaws.

Goût is very good at the small true thing, and the small true things carried me through the places where the sentences didn’t. Aurora takes a blood pressure pill because a side effect is that it stops her dreaming, and she keeps it in the same bottle as her homemade mushroom microdoses, all of it packed in matching red and beige capsules, told apart by which ones have a code stamped on the side. At the repatriation ceremony the museum stands up an empty crate with a poster of a giant Olmec stone mouth on it so the photographers have something to shoot, and in the press photos it looks like the gate to the underworld is about to eat a row of lawyers. Plastic champagne flutes. Maria’s mole, and the mezcal nobody gets to touch until she has finished saying how proud she is. A little girl in East Texas coaxes a wild quail into eating seed out of her palm and her grandmother comes across the garden like the bird is a gas leak.

And the ghost pipe. It’s a real plant. I looked it up at one in the morning like an idiot. White as a candle, no chlorophyll, no use for the sun, lives on what it can pull off the fungus and tree roots under the forest floor. In Rooted it starts coming up through the cracks in the pavement, pinkish, warm to the touch, and the bells turn to look at her. I have a high tolerance and that got under it. Everything frightening in this book grows out of that plant and that god: skin that doesn’t sit right on a face, a seam at the corner of an eye, a second set of lips moving behind the first, a city in drought splitting like a heel. It is one image worked over and over and he never lets go of it. Goût trained at Central Saint Martins and was making sculpture and paintings long before he published a novel, he has shown at MoMA PS1, and it figures. Every scare in here is something you could cast.

He is also a television producer, and that figures too. He spent close to a decade in business with James Patterson, the Alex Cross movie and Zoo, and between jobs wrote Ghost Radio, a YA trilogy, an illustrated novella with the filmmaker Eva Aridjis, and Piñata, the 2023 possession novel that was his first for Nightfire and made Esquire’s list of the year’s best horror. That one came out of something he’d learned about the friars who brought the piñata to Mexico. They painted Nahua gods on them, filled them with food, and handed hungry children a stick. He has said what he was chasing was “the pure terror of losing our memory of the past.” He grew up in Mexico City, raised by a single mother who put up Indigenous pilgrims in the house, and later turned up a Zapotec ancestor on his father’s side. Rooted takes that same terror and aims it at the people who think they’re the ones doing the remembering. Aurora’s whole career is moving stolen objects to the correct building. The book’s opinion, and it takes its time arriving, is that a different glass case is not home.

The producer shows in the engine. Chapters end on a button and cut to black. It moves. I read it in two sittings and never once checked how many pages were left. But I came up playing in bands and I have to say it: the prose has about two dynamics. Shivers go down spines. Blood runs cold. Pulses pound in ears, a lot of ears. Aurora retches into two separate wastebaskets. And the dialogue, whenever it has theme to deliver, goes stiff as a press release. Maria is so alive when she’s nagging about papaya and soup, and then over dinner she tells her daughter she’s finally doing “work that truly resonates with your heart,” and no mother has said that, over mole or over anything else. The middle has a loop in it, too. See a flower, run home, Mamá coughs, don’t sleep, go again. Four bars, repeated.

The last act has a lot of explaining to do and does it out loud. The visions hand over the family history in tidy order, like exhibits, and then people who love each other stand in a room and tell each other how the magic works. I wanted less. The pictures had already told me.

But. The best scene in the book has no god in it. It’s a window at the civil registry, a clerk with her hair in a hard bun, a line of people waiting behind Aurora, and a printer warming up. I won’t tell you what she asks for. The look she gets back is the funniest thing in the novel and I laughed, and about four seconds later I felt like shit for laughing, which is the correct sequence. And there’s Ociel, the college ex, an archeologist who gets as giddy about opening a box as a kid at Christmas. At one point he drags a hotel armchair up to the bed, takes her hand, and sets a timer on his phone to wake her before she can sink deep enough to dream. I would have married him in that chair. He scratches at his forearm the whole time. Eczema, he says. Everybody in this book has a perfectly reasonable explanation.

The ending I’m not touching. It goes bigger than I thought a book this apartment-sized had in it, it costs what it ought to cost, and I believed most of it. Then the epilogue goes down into the museum and shows you one picture, the best idea in the whole novel and the truest thing it has to say about what Aurora does for a living, and he held it back until the last five pages. That’s a sculptor. He makes you walk all the way around the thing before he lets you see the face.

Ghost pipe grows in the county where I live. I’ve walked past it for years and thought it was a mushroom.

[Hannah · Rating 5 out of 5]

Rooted is a slow burn eco/religious/body horror centered around a jaded art lawyer and her mission to repatriate ancient artifacts to Mexico. What she doesn't anticipate is that much like a stunted plant, once both the relics, and herself, are free to dig their roots into their native soil, once they're home, the result is a rapid and unexpected awakening that affects not just Aurora's hard won mental stability, but the structural stability of Mexico City as a whole.

The story paints a tender and comprehensible portrait of an ancient god whose complexity has been thoroughly maligned outside of the context in which he was worshipped. Xipe Totec, a fleshless god robed in the skin of another, presents an unquestionably ghastly image; especially to a world so removed from its roots. Rooted does not flinch away from that, but asserts rather bluntly the cyclical nature of creation: life is death, death is decay, decay feeds the forest floor, and from that rich loam springs life eternal. There's no attempt at gentling the imagery to make The Flayed One more palatable, instead Goût leans into the full complexity of the fertility god: life, death, rebirth, rot, agriculture, skin afflictions, healing - I appreciate gods that are allowed to be as multifaceted as the people who worship them.

Aside from the obvious horror elements, Rooted is a testimony to the unconditional love of family and their willingness to shoulder unfathomable weight for those who cannot, or should not, bear it. Despite our main character being well into her adult years, Rooted is truly a coming-of-age story in which a lost little girl is finally in a position to accept her destiny and fully step into her power.

Written with a gentle rhythm and a fairly open ending, this may be one of the best slow burns I've read in a very long time. Thank you to NetGalley, Goût, and Tor for the opportunity.

[Lorin (paperbackbish)]

Thank you Tor Nightfire for my free ARC of Rooted by Leopoldo Goût — out Sep 15!

» READ IF YOU «
🗿 know how terrifying Aztec mythology can be
🏙️ want your horror steeped in colonial reckoning
🐢 can handle a slow pace and an MC who does dumb things

» SYNOPSIS «
Aurora returns to Mexico City to celebrate the repatriation of a stolen Aztec artifact, a statue of a god known as the Flayed One. But the city seems foreign to her now, and she keeps seeing odd things. Caring for her sick mother, Aurora starts to question her grip on reality as old family secrets resurface and it becomes clear the Flayed One has no intention of resting quietly.

» REVIEW «
Firstly, I will be upfront and let y'all know that this book was a genuine struggle for me. Mostly because of the FMC, Aurora. She is described as 34 years old and an accomplished lawyer, but she reads more like 14 years old for a lot of the story. Her actions were sometimes so baffling that I had a hard time rooting for her, even when I wanted to. The disconnect between who she's supposed to be and how she actually reads on the page made it tough for me to invest in her unraveling.

Something that might have contributed to this, for me anyway, is the audio narration—I'd (for once) recommend reading this one with your eyeballs rather than your earballs. The narrator is wonderful, but her performance leaned youthful, and it might have influenced me even further in that direction. So if you go in via text instead, Aurora's age might land more convincingly for you. Let me know if so!

The mythology and the setting are the strongest, most enjoyable parts of the book. Goût clearly knows how to make Mexico City itself feel alive and unstable, and the Aztec lore woven into the heart of the story is compelling and terrifying. The prologue alone SLAPS! I just wish I had connected with the character carrying us through this journey.

» RATING «
🗿 I'm Uprooted 🗿

» READ-A-LIKES «
• No Place to Bury the Dead by Karina Sainz Borgo
• Bochica by Carolina Flórez-Cerchiaro
• Eating Ashes by Brenda Navarro
• Coco (2017 film)

[Katja Urban · Rating 2 out of 5]

Zelooo slow pacing in v bistvu se nič ne zgodi.



"She stood in him. The body of Aurora's father shifted, jerking softly upward as the girl pulled her foot out, blood soaked to the ankle, and stepped into the floor in a quiet squelch."

[Julia · Rating 3 out of 5]

What an absolute banger of a prologue. I was impressed by how visceral and emotionally strong the opening felt. Anger, rage, sadness, hope, gruesome death, and a terrifying statue.

Therein lies the dilemma. It was so hard to live up to this. The subsequent story does not add significantly to what we learn in the opener by inference (if you have decent reading comprehension skills).

If you are interested in the Aztec god(s) and learning more of the culture it is a worthwhile read but would have been stronger as a shorter novella. I’ll still look forward to reading more by Leopoldo Gout in the future.

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for this advanced copy. All opinions are my own.

[Ebony · Rating 2.5 out of 5]

2.5 rounded up

The prologue got me hooked. The history in this book was super interesting but everything else just fell flat for me. The prologue is the book. That’s it. The pacing is absolutely brutal and the horror was just ok at times. This felt more like a mystery for MC than anything the way she’s always confused and trying to figure things out. I also got whiplash from her calling her mother by her government name and back to mama? Is it regular for children in this culture to call their parents by their full names? Or elders in general? I hate that I didn’t enjoy this because I had high hopes.

[Azhar · Rating 2 out of 5]

the prologue was probably the best part.

[Cathye Aka OrionReads · Rating 5 out of 5]

If you can't trust what you see with your eyes, how can you know it's real?

Leopoldo Goût writes amazing horror. I never know what is coming, but I know it's going to be creepy and slightly disturbing.

I recommend going in as blind as you can to Rooted. You will never guess what comes out of the novel. Goût builds the tension so well, with a blend of grotesque, I was shocked and anxious for Aurora throughout.

Thank you Netgalley, Leopoldo Goût, and Tor for the advanced copy. My review is voluntary and honest

[Tya C.]

Piñata is one of my favorite books of all time, so I was incredibly excited for Rooted! However, this just fell flat for me. I couldn’t finish it.

This story started off so disturbing. I was hooked from the prologue. And I can say that it was consistently creepy throughout the story. However, the pacing was sooo slow. Although there were these creepy moments throughout, the pacing was TOO consistent to the point where the story became repetitive. There were no exciting moments or big reveals. It was consistently creepy, but nothing new was happening. And I feel like I figure out the “big reveal” pretty early on in the book. And since the story became very boring to me, I never felt called to finish. I stopped reading at 79%.

I feel like this story would’ve been much better as a novella.

Thank you Tor Nightfire and NetGalley for this arc. All opinions are my own.

[Robin · Rating 4 out of 5]

Have you ever returned home to take care of your mother only to be exposed to a cursed ancient artifact that unearths dark memories buried in your psyche The Flayed One?

Me neither. But for this is Aurora’s world and we’re just watching it crack apart around her.

Rooted weaves the horrific, bloody elements of Mexico’s history and mythology and churns out a reckoning. The foundation of modern Mexico City forces itself to be recognized. It’s a story about preservation and sacrifice and the curse upon which progress is built.

Thank you always @tornightfire for sending me a copy!

[Lori · Rating 3 out of 5]

Do all of Leopoldo’s books start painfully slow and then unleash all the chaos in the final act? Because at this point, Piñata and Rooted are making a very compelling case. Sometimes leading with the weird is fine — but not when it’s only in the prologue, which he seems to love to do.

And the prologue here is suuuuuch a tease. You rub your palms together thinking, okay, yaaaaas, this is gonna be good. And then the main timeline kicks in and you’re like… wait… is this the same book? When do we get back to the weird stuff? Soon? No? Oh, you’re going to make us wait a painfully long time. Sigh.

In Rooted, we meet Aurora, returning home after many years away. She’s excited to see her mother again, and she’s coordinating the return of stolen ancient artifacts to her hometown museum. As with any homecoming story worth its weight, we know there’s a reason she left, even though the reason might not be clear yet... and now that she’s back, the memories and nightmares start rushing in, surfacing right as they unbox a creepy statue of Xipe Totec, The Flayed One, an old god who does not exactly bring comfort.

It’s another “that’s what you get for going home again” novel, this time filtered through Aztec mythology, Mexican folklore, a touch of body and fungal horror, a generous scoop of mental instability, and a very… uhm… painful reconciliation? Or maybe it's more like a reckoning? Fuck it, it's kind of a bit of both.

When the ending finally brings the action, we remember the slow build up and the not‑quite‑horror vibe, so the book's imbalance kept this one from fully landing for me. Not bad enough to DNF, but not a book you'll see me raving about either. Which is shameful because hello, have you seen the cover? It's stunning.

[Kate · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was my first book by Leopoldo Gout and I can’t wait to read more! This was slow and atmospheric and kind of beautiful. I really enjoyed the writing style and the slowly creeping tension. There were times I wanted more from it, more scares, more character development, more with the museum plot line, but I still loved the direction it chose to go. The ending was so well done and I love the imagery of the ghost pipe.

[Trevor Williamson · Rating 5 out of 5]

Disclosure Statement: I received a finished copy of this novel from the publisher. My thoughts and opinions have not been influenced in any way by either the publisher or the author.

Rooted is Mexican Gothic through and through, picking at postcolonial concepts and grasping for a future released from the historic subjugation of indigenous peoples by European culture. Set in Mexico City and dealing with the civic decay of the city, the book sets out to recover history and the philosophy of life of earlier Mesoamerican cultures as a lens to refocus our attention on the world we live in.

One of the things I love the most about this book is how much is done to resituate indigenous culture back into the dialogue of how we should move toward a better, more equitable future. I don't mean to say that figures like Xipe Totec are intended as egalitarian figures, but that the book revisits indigenous culture without the lens of colonialism and its specific oppressions, allowing for an alternative imagining of what Mexico City's future could be. It's the book's fearless ability to think outside the pressures of modern capital that have me the most excited about Goût's work.

His Xipe Totec thus becomes less a central figure of horror and one of potential renewal, even if some of his horrifying aspects remain. But Goût asks us what we really think of as horror, and why it so often is predicated on the colonial mindset. Rather than something that must be suppressed and contained, Goût insists throughout the novel that these figures should be part of our modern discourse, and deserve to be read not as white Europeans might have us read them, but as indigenous cultures would have presented them, with all their nuances and rich themes.

The book also ties together these aspects of repression with a reflection on how we sublimate our own power away in favor of a more palatable presentation of self, how we carve away the powerful parts of our histories and our personalities to make us more presentable to the world--and how much that can cost when it comes to how we navigate society. Rather than fetter ourselves, our histories, our stories, the book insists that we confront our power, that we think of what we can do to rejuvenate our communities, and to restore the wonders hidden away and buried beneath the crumbling facade of a society imperiled by the appetites and attitudes of colonialism and capital.

Deeply rooted in personal and emotional stakes and keenly aware of our cultural moment, Rooted presents a powerful statement on our relationship to the past and the importance of our futures.

[ThatBookish_deviant · Rating 3.25 out of 5]

“The seed grows in its rotting hull.”

[KarCar · Rating 4 out of 5]

First, thank you to NetGalley for the ARC in exchange for an honest review.

After loving Piñata, I was incredibly excited to pick up another horror novel by Leopoldo Goût, and Rooted absolutely delivered what I’ve come to expect from his writing.

This is not fast-paced, jump-scare horror.

It’s a slow burn steeped in Mesoamerican mythology, family secrets, identity, sacrifice, and history. If you’ve read Piñata, you’ll recognize that same deliberate pacing and richly layered storytelling. Personally, I think it works. The slower pace allows the tension to build naturally, making Aurora’s gradual unraveling feel all the more unsettling.

And that opening…

The prologue immediately grabs your attention with some wonderfully grotesque body horror, setting the tone for a story that’s creepy, atmospheric, and deeply unsettling. While this is undeniably a horror novel, it’s also so much more than that. Beneath the horror lies a thoughtful exploration of cultural identity, repatriation, family, and the complicated relationship between history and the present.

One of my favorite aspects was the setting itself. As someone who’s very familiar with Mexico City, I loved how vividly Goût brings it to life. Whether Aurora was walking through the Centro Histórico, passing Templo Mayor, or making her way to the Metro, I could picture every street and every landmark. The city isn’t just a backdrop—it feels like another character in the story.

That said, I do think the pacing occasionally became too slow. There were stretches that felt a bit repetitive, and I found myself wishing some of that time had been spent expanding the mythology even further. Xipe Totec has such an incredible presence throughout the novel that I wanted even more. The same goes for the repatriated artifacts themselves—they’re fascinating, and I would’ve loved to see their role explored in greater depth. Likewise, Ociel’s storyline felt a little rushed by the end, especially after such a carefully paced build-up.

Even with those criticisms, I found this to be a beautifully written novel. Goût has such a poetic writing style, and he has a remarkable ability to weave horror together with culture, history, and mythology without sacrificing either. The result is a story that’s eerie, thought-provoking, and deeply immersive.

This won’t be for everyone. It’s a patient, atmospheric horror novel that asks you to sit with its themes as much as its scares. But if you’re looking for horror that’s rooted in mythology, culture, and identity—and especially if you enjoyed Piñata—I think you’ll find a lot to appreciate here.

[April M · Rating 5 out of 5]

A beautiful psychological novel that embodied both botanical and body horror with its roots firmly planted in Mexican lore!

Full of the ghost pipe flowers, Nuhuatl ancient magic, mummies, and Forgotten Gods, this book is an instant staple for me now! Goût was able to capture that familiarity I felt (personally) and shift it into a space for the uncanny to be seen, on top of a dreadful eeriness that felt like watching a part of yourself in another skin.

I also felt incredibly nostalgic reading this one. Having recently lost my mom, reading about the same places she grew up in Mexico written here in the book, revisiting the places she took me to (such as the Museo Nacional de Antropologia) was both really cathartic and touching. The grief had me in tears a few times in this book, but in a beautiful way. The ending was deeply moving and fitting.

I also was so creeped out & disturbed in parts (in a good way!)

Well done. 5/5

❝𝘛𝘩𝘦 𝘴𝘦𝘦𝘥 𝘨𝘳𝘰𝘸𝘴 𝘪𝘯 𝘪𝘵𝘴 𝘳𝘰𝘵𝘵𝘪𝘯𝘨 𝘩𝘶𝘭𝘭.❞

𝗧𝗵𝗮𝗻𝗸 𝘆𝗼𝘂 𝘁𝗼 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝗔𝘂𝘁𝗵𝗼𝗿 𝗮𝗻𝗱 𝗧𝗼𝗿 𝗣𝘂𝗯𝗹𝗶𝘀𝗵𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝗳𝗼𝗿 𝗽𝗿𝗼𝘃𝗶𝗱𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝘁𝗵𝗶𝘀 𝗯𝗼𝗼𝗸 𝘃𝗶𝗮 𝗡𝗲𝘁𝗚𝗮𝗹𝗹𝗲𝘆 𝗳𝗼𝗿 𝗮𝗻 𝗵𝗼𝗻𝗲𝘀𝘁 𝗿𝗲𝘃𝗶𝗲𝘄. 𝗔𝗹𝗹 𝗼𝗽𝗶𝗻𝗶𝗼𝗻𝘀 𝗮𝗿𝗲 𝗺𝘆 𝗼𝘄𝗻.
𝘉𝘰𝘰𝘬 𝘳𝘦𝘭𝘦𝘢𝘴𝘦𝘴 𝘚𝘦𝘱𝘵𝘦𝘮𝘣𝘦𝘳 15𝘵𝘩




𝗧𝗪: Blood & Gore, Body Horror, Child Death, Pregnancy, Grief, Mental Breakdowns and Psychosis, Death of Family Member, Disembowelment, Suicide, Animal Death, Psychological terror, Colonialism

[Netanella · Rating 4 out of 5]

Family secrets and Aztec mythology mix in this slow burn horror story set in modern day Mexico City. After a tremendously violent and graphic opening sequence, the story settles into the slower pace of Aurora's story, as she returns to her birth city of Mexico City to take care of her aging mother. Increasingly, Aurora begins to see strange visions that are rooted both in her own past and the ancient past of the city.

Despite the slow pacing, I really enjoyed the cultural and mythological window that this book offered. There are so many vivid descriptions of the city, of its people moving around its various neighborhoods and districts. Beneath the bustling exterior, however, the author paints a slightly creepy picture. "The city sprawled out before her, its pulsating lights resembling veins under the cover of darkness, the city's anatomy laid bare. The neon glow cast eerie shadows on the walls."

Eerier still are the spooky ghost pipe flowers that seem to sprout all over the city's cracked pavement and turn to follow Aurora around as she navigates the city. I'd never heard of ghost pipe before, and now that I have, I'm not sure I want to encounter this particular plant, in the wild or anywhere.



The story seems to be an offering to Mexico City herself, honoring its ancient foundations and peoples. Aurora's archaeological friend Ociel explains to her why the city is sinking into the dry lake bed: "If we were half the engineers the Aztecs were, maybe we'd actually know when to stop before we just sink into the earth. We've forgotten the history of this place, thinking we know better than the people who were here before us, and now it's biting us in the ass." I can't say he's wrong.

The big bad of the story is the Aztec god Xipe Totec, the Aztec deity of agriculture, death, and rebirth, also known as the Flayed One. There are some truly creepy scenes involving hidden figures within others, the skin creating gaps around eye sockets, a second set of teeth before the first ones. I was pretty creeped out by some of the imagery.

I'm glad to have finally read Leopoldo Gout, as I've been eyeing his Piñata for a while now. Time to find a copy and read!

[Kiersten · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book has one of the most killer openings that I’ve read, and I’ll certainly be thinking about the setup for some time. The rest of the book is definitely more slow-burn horror, but it is visceral and raw in a way that I really enjoyed.

This book certainly won’t be for everyone. If I had one critique, I would say the book feels repetitive in some spots. But I do applaud the author for writing a book that doesn’t feel like any other horror book that I’ve read. By beautifully capturing Mexican/Aztec history and Nahua culture/mythology, he has created something truly singular. While the story and mythologies relied upon may be different, the themes are wholly relatable.

This book ultimately grapples with identity and the idea of home - is home a place or where your people are? Since this book deals so heavily with Nahua culture and folklore, this is a particularly interesting idea as with many indigenous groups, the idea of home becomes difficult to grasp when your home was taken or colonized. With the setup of this book being about artifacts being repatriated from colonizer countries back to Mexico, these ideas really resonate and spread throughout the novel. Having our main character, Aurora, also returning to Mexico after years away, the connections can be made at both the societal and personal level about what home is and what happens to your identity when you lose your home.

This book deals with some heavy topics for a horror novel, but I think the author does a spectacular job of keeping things grounded while also having a lot to say on the legacy left behind by colonialism in Mexico on both the people and the land. The horrors of this novel, while graphic and truly chilling, pale in comparison to the violence inflicted on the original inhabitants and the land itself. This book in parts reads like an eco-horror which I really enjoyed. I hope this book finds its audience because I definitely think the themes will resonate with so many readers, and I think this is the kind of story that needs to be told more often.

[✶⋆.° shaylee °.⋆✶ · Rating 2 out of 5]

Oh man. I'm so sad to be rating this book so low. After reading the synopsis, I honestly had high hopes and I expected this to be a lot better of a book.
The premise is a great set up for the book, and I really enjoyed all the cultural and historical aspects of the story. This book is under 300 pages and somehow feels MUCH longer than that. One of my least favorite subplot in books is dreams or visions and that is pretty much all this book was. I was hoping for more history, and research rather than all these long chapters talking about the visions and dreams aurora was having. Even the horror aspects of this were really light and I feel like it could've gone way farther and provided a more effective horror story. The most gruesome part of the book is the prologue and it gave away some of the story.
I have a lot of emotions towards this book and I'm sure other people will really enjoy it. But overall it was boring and that's that.

Thank you Nightfire for sending me an advanced reader copy!

[Karen Bullock · Rating 4 out of 5]

An interesting read that deals with Aztecs, dark gods and cursed families.

Practices of families that once used to worship to Gods that provided abundance of crops, well needed rain for drought driven land and the promise of cooler air through powerful winds.

Aurora, the MC, has procured the rights to return certain artifacts and art from European museums back to their place of origin-Mexico, in this case. Inside one of the crates is a statue dating back to early 1800’s and that is where the terror, truly begins.

Night terrors, sleepwalking, ghostly images and realizing one’s fears are based off actual happenings in one’s own family history, is most unsettling.

Is it the belief that a non worshipped god can be vengeful? That if one person mocks its previous family’s beliefs and ownership of a god statue, it can curse the next generation?

Truly fascinating and yet deeply disturbing.

Thanks to TOR Nightfire for this arc and a chance at another new horror author.