Novel Review: The Daughter of Doctor Moreau
I wanted to collect my thoughts on The Daughter of Doctor Moreau before I completely forget that I read it. Please forgive this needlessly long brain dump as I try to turn my thoughts into text. I’m going to touch on spoilers so please avoid this post if you have any intentions of reading the book yourself.
The Daughter of Doctor Moreau was written by Silvia Moreno-Garcia who I already knew as the author of Mexican Gothic. I adore Mexican Gothic but I didn’t read The Daughter of Doctor Moreau because of that admiration. Instead, I picked it up on the recommendation of a friend who told me that Moreno-Garcia’s newest book had monster girl romance in it. Now, I’m not a furry, but when I heard that some of the monster girls were cat girls, I just had to get my hands on it as soon as possible.
There was no way a western novel, especially not a mainstream “best-seller” had cat girl romance in it, right? That had to be a mistake.
I was wrong. There is indeed cat girl romance in The Daughter of Doctor Moreau.
The monsters in this story are mutants – human and animal hybrids created by the mad scientist Dr. Moreau in his bid to perfect humanity. They range from 1-3 on the furry scale and come in all shapes and sizes so there’s fun to be found for everyone no matter where you fall on the monster enthusiast spectrum. As mentioned above, there is cat girl and human romance. The romance is light – not quite enough to be a Fur Affinity or Deviantart submission – but it exists. In my opinion, it does not go as far as I would have liked it to but it was my favorite aspect of the book. The extraordinary romance adds an interesting dynamic to the other genres this book touches on.
I’ve seen The Daughter of Doctor Moreau described as genre-blending historical, science fiction, and romantic narrative. In accordance with the genre mixing, the story alternates between the perspectives of Montgomery, an impoverished alcoholic forced to find work in the Yucatán, and Cartola, a mutant creation of her mad scientist father. In the end, both the historical and sci-fi aspects of the book seemed more like info dumping rather than world building – a way to contextualize the romance but with little to no major implications on the story. While romance was far more prominent than the other genres, even that seemed to fall short.
The Daughter of Doctor Moreau takes place in Mexico during the Caste War of Yucatán. The struggle for power between different castes within the Yucatán acts as a framework for the story. The Lizalde family holds power over the Moreau family who are dependent on them for research funding. The Moreau family, Dr. Moreau and Cartola included, hold power over Montgomery, who is dependent on them for work and housing. Finally, Cartola and the other hybrids are dependent on Dr. Moreau for a mysterious injection that keeps them alive. There are mentions of Maya rebels and other aspects of the social system present in the real Caste War of Yucatán but outside of the direct power struggles mentioned above, they have very little bearing on the overall plot.
If you’re looking for a grounded sci-fi story like H. G. Wells’ original The Island of Dr. Moreau you may be disappointed. There are indeed sci-fi elements in Moreno-Garcia’s reimagining, but I found them strangely written and hard to take seriously. The doctor himself hardly sounds like a doctor in the few times he rants about his science and the methodology behind his creations is very inconsistent. For example, the book’s major revelation about Dr. Moreau’s injections seems contradictory to the way Cartola acts without them. It gets even stranger with how inconsistent the other mutants act in the climax of the book. What I thought would be a major turning point in the narrative to show how Cartola was no longer dependent on her father made me question if that even was the case at all.
Speaking of Cartola’s dependance on her father, the ending itself seemed inconstant and contradictory to the larger narrative of escaping from a power struggle. While no longer under direct control of her father, Cartola is still ultimately dependent on the Moreau family to receive an inheritance and sustain her lifestyle. I feel like it would have been more meaningful for Cartola to become a self-made scientist, but I digress.
The romance aspects of the book seemed both overdone and underdone. The romance clearly outshines the historical and science fiction elements but it just doesn’t go far enough. The love triangle is more annoying than dramatic. Early on the Lizaldes are painted as villains so I found the son’s betrayal predictable, if not comical. There is clear romantic tension between Montgomery and Cartola but the book paints him to be more of a father figure to her than a lover. I mean, I get it. There’s a large age gap between them and Montgomery is a remorseless alcoholic but their relationship felt so frustrating to me. The love was clearly there but it was almost like the author was too afraid to commit to writing them as a couple and left it up to the reader to fill in the blanks.
Looking through my rambling thoughts, it’s pretty clear to me that I didn’t really like The Daughter of Doctor Moreau. I wasn’t expecting to read a mainstream book with cat girls in it this year but after I got over the fact that such a thing exists, it left me feeling underwhelmed. That being said, it certaintly wasn’t the worst book I’ve read this year and I don’t regret reading it. In the end, I am a sucker for gothic romances and that genre combined with my weeby love of monster girls made this book worth reading for me.