Yulene Olaizola’s mystic, minimalist tale of colonialism, greed, and desire takes place in the 1920s, deep in the Mayan jungles between Mexico and what was then British Honduras (now Belize). A young Belizean woman, running from a rich British landowner, becomes the captive of a group of Indigenous laborers, who view her with curiosity, fear, and lust. Is she simply a woman on the run or the beautiful Mayan demon and man-killer Xtabay? Part dream-soaked, crepuscular horror tale, Herzog-ian epic of man vs. nature, and tactile immersion into the environment, Tragic Jungle “engages with indigenous legends and colonial history across a story where misogyny is turned against the patriarchy” (Slant Magazine).