Goodreads Monday is a weekly meme started by @Lauren’s Page Turners but is currently hosted by Emily @ Budget Tales Book Blog. This meme is quite easy to follow – just randomly pick a book from your to-be-read list and explain why you want to read it. It is that simple.

This week’s book:

Electric Shamans at the Festival of the Sun by Mónica Ojeda

Blurb from Goodreads

The ear is the organ of fear. It is a door to that which is not of this world.

Leaving behind the dread and decay of the city, Noa and her best friend, Nicole, travel up into the Andes, headed for Solar Noise: an eight-day festival that takes place in the infinite expanse of the páramo. Nestled on the side of a volcano, it is a world of mysticism, shamanism and underground music, a world in tune with the thunder of the earth and the bellows of the mountains, a world in which the belief systems of Ecuador’s indigenous communities live on.

Noa also harbours a secret motive for attending the festival: she’s been drawn there in search of her father, who abandoned her as a child, and who now lives somewhere near the festival site. But soon after their arrival, she becomes prone to somnambulism and begins speaking in a voice that is not her own. Uncertain of whether Noa is in danger or is communing with something primal and eternal, Nicole struggles to care for her friend. Until, as the party spills into Inti Raymi – the Incan festival of the sun – the girls’ desire for belonging burns, incandescent, collapsing the thin membrane separating life from death, trauma from transcendence, and ecstasy from oblivion.

Wild and incantatory, Electric Shamans at the Festival of the Sun is both an hallucinogenic trip of a novel, and a heartfelt meditation on love, family and kinship – one that announces the arrival of a major writer.

Why I Want To Read It

Happy Monday, everyone! It is the first Monday of 2026! Before anything else, I wish everyone a Happy New Year! I hope everyone will have a great 2026. I hope it is going to be a year of healing, blessings, positivity, growth, and answered prayers. Despite the uncertainties the future holds, time keeps pressing forward—regardless of our readiness. While the future remains shrouded in uncertainty, there’s still much to look forward to. The new year brims with hope and fresh starts. I hope everything goes well for everyone this new year. I hope 2026 will be kind to us all. I hope good news and kindness come knocking on your doors in the coming year. Wishing you continued success and happiness.

So yes. Mondays. I know—not many people get excited about Mondays (though I’m sure a few are out there). I, too, am not exactly a fan. After all, we’ve got to start somewhere, and Monday is one of those starting points. Speaking of starts. Today, I started in my new job. I am a little nervous, but I am also excited about what it has in store for me. I hope everything turns out well in my job. I hope and pray the same for everyone. Today has been cold here in the Philippines. The skies are overcast, although the sun occasionally peeks through. I still feel sluggish after the long holiday. I believe the majority feels the same. But it is time to go back to reality. It is time to go back to work. Unfortunately. With this, I hope everyone is doing well—mentally, emotionally, and physically—and that we all make it through (or survive) the workweek.

With the start of a new week also comes a new reading adventure, hence a fresh Goodreads Monday update, my first for this year. The new year certainly brings along with it new plans and goals. Also, it comes with new releases that I am looking forward to. As such, the first Goodreads Monyda update of the year will feature a book to be released this year that I am looking forward to. It was just today that I came across Ecuadorian writer Mónica Ojeda. I can’t recall ever reading any work by an Ecuadorian writer. Further, this is in line with my current reading journey; I resolved to start the year by reading works of Latin American writers. Actually, I only came across Ojeda when I was researching for most anticipated books in translation of 2026.

Originally published in 2024 as Chamanes eléctricos en la fiesta del sol, one of the first things that piqued my interest about the book was its title. Electric Shamans at the Festival of the Sun does sound both fancy and eccentric. But I guess it comes with the territory. The book is tagged as a work of horror fiction; it is a genre that I avoid as much as I can. Regardless, the book has captured my imagination. Recently, I learned that the place approximately closest to the sun is Ecuador’s Chimborazo volcano. Being on the equator, this comes as no surprise, perhaps. But I have seen documentaries and videos about the different energy fields in a particular place in the Latin American nation, although I have forgotten about it. More than anything else, I am looking forward to the prospect of exploring a new literary world.

The book’s English translation is set to be released on April 9. I hope the book will become available here in the Philippines. How about you, fellow readers? How was your Monday? What books have you recently added to your reading list? Drop your thoughts in the comments. For now—happy Monday, and as always, happy reading!