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As I sit here writing this, yet another hurricane is about to hit the Carribean. In the capital of San Juan, on the island of Puerto Rico, the citizens are all too knowledgeable of what often happens during storms like these. In spite of the years passing by, nothing ever seems to get any better there.

In House of Bone and Rain, Hurricane Maria is bearing down on the island and its people are getting ready. A group of best friends is mourning the death of one of their mothers, whose name is also Maria. She was shot while working the door of a local club. The group decides to figure out who was behind it, and are bent on getting revenge. As Maria sweeps in, these young men go about their vengeful action-plan. Will they be able to get justice for Maria, the person? Will they survive Maria, the hurricane? Will they survive at all? You'll have to read this to find out!

"Every story is a ghost story." One of the young men's grandmother's told him this. He didn't believe it at first, but he did by the end of the story. As I mull this over in my mind, I too, think she might be right.

As with every tale I've read from Gabino, this is written in a type of Spang-lish. (Unless you are a Spanish speaker, I recommend reading on Kindle because it takes only a swipe to get the translation.) For whatever reason, this doesn't bother me at all, I only mention it so you know what you're getting into before you start.

I am trying to find something new to say about Gabino's work. Everything I love about him as a writer is in this story. He has a way of creating characters that is...sublime. None of them are perfectly good or perfectly bad. They seem like real people, making decisions that real people would likely make. In this way, we get to know each character, what makes them tick, and what motivates them. Some of the things that happen here seem batsh*t crazy, yet because we know what's behind those occurrences, we as readers, accept it. Because that's what we would do-at least most of the time. Maybe.

I felt for each of these young men. Not only for what they had to deal with in this narrative, (and that's a LOT), but because their lives are already hard. Living in a place that constantly gets spanked with tropical storms and hurricanes, yet nothing ever changes. No new power grids. No new way to get clean water. No way to dispose of the inevitable bodies that result from each storm. Yet, NOTHING ever changes. If you think about what kind of strength that must take day after day, year after year, then you know some of these characters already.

Once again, here I sit trying to describe how Gabino made me feel. Once again, I am left with a broken heart and a small smidge of hope. Why do I keep subjecting myself to this kind of torture? It's that hope: it's because Gabino somehow infuses all this drab dreariness with a bit of hope. It's because his writing is often flat out beautiful, without being tedious or overwritten. It's the writing of a person you know has GONE THROUGH IT, the writing itself, drips with truth, and because it's Gabino, you believe it. I BELIEVE IT, GABINO and I believe in you.

House of Rain and Bone contains what I feel is the best of Gabino's writing thus far, and I'm already itching to read his next book.

My highest recommendation!

*ARC from publisher.*