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3.56 AVERAGE
3.56 AVERAGE
dark
emotional
reflective
sad
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
emotional
hopeful
reflective
relaxing
sad
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
challenging
dark
emotional
sad
tense
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
adventurous
lighthearted
relaxing
fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
No
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
adventurous
emotional
hopeful
inspiring
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Complicated
I rather enjoyed this book. It read a lot like a fairy-tale (especially at the beginning) and I loved the character of Amelia. I also really liked how her story developed though I can't help but feel like the beginning part with the fisherman was a bit short considering the impact it has on her story later on. I also wasn't overly convinced by the romance though they were definitely cute together. I also rather liked the ending and the optimistic note it finished on. Overall, I did like this book and would like to read more by this author.
This is now one of my favorite books and I can only hope to convey the brilliance and wonder of it with this review. The story itself is about a mermaid who is discovered by PT Barnum and joins his show. The interesting thing is that it is loosely based on his life and his hoax mermaid. The book actually includes many true stories of his life and career and includes many of the real life people that he surrounded himself with.
But more importantly, the mermaid! Amelia is a mystical creature of the sea who has wanderlust and is exploring the world far from her home. She is caught up in a fisherman's net and he frees her but they had a moment where their eyes locked and she can feel his sadness and loneliness and that creates a bond which brings her back to him. She lives with him until he dies in a remote Maine town where the people eventually accept her and protect her as one of their own. A drunken fisherman sees her transform one night and the story reaches PT Barnum who sends, Levi (his lawyer) up to find her. He finds madly in love with her and his yearning and longing for her is described so wistfully and so ethereally that I could feel it. Which leads me to another point.
The prose in this book is magnificent, magical, enchanting, and otherwordly. Christina Henry's writing style is exquisite and incredibly atmospheric. Ok back to the story.
Amelia (as the mermaid decides to be called) and PT Barnum have a lot of conflict because he perceives himself as owning her but she is a wild creature and can not owned. This book goes beyond beyond a fairytale in that it takes a deep and profound look at how tamed women are expected to be. While of course, the times were more restrictive, I still see a lot of Amelia's observations on how women are expected to behave and how they are supposed to take a backseat to their husbands to still be true today. Her observations on society and how incredibly oppressive and inauthentic it is resonated deeply with me. When Levi says that she was so mysterious that he thought he would never know her because she was like the ocean, she responds that the ocean, and her, weren't so mysterious, you just had to be willing to delve deep below the surface. So much symbolism and philosophical truths in this book! And beautifully stated. I swooned.
The main theme of this book for me was yearning. The current of longing runs through all of the story and the subplots and is romanticized but made me feel wistful. I was nostalgic for something I could not name.
Beautifully written and filled with so many incredible quotes and metaphors that left me in awe. I loved the history, the story, the characters, the descriptions, the philosphy, the themes of feminism, yearning, wanderlust, and society, and the writing style....I feel as though I've left this world and coming back makes me feel disjointed. Ah...this book...<3
But more importantly, the mermaid! Amelia is a mystical creature of the sea who has wanderlust and is exploring the world far from her home. She is caught up in a fisherman's net and he frees her but they had a moment where their eyes locked and she can feel his sadness and loneliness and that creates a bond which brings her back to him. She lives with him until he dies in a remote Maine town where the people eventually accept her and protect her as one of their own. A drunken fisherman sees her transform one night and the story reaches PT Barnum who sends, Levi (his lawyer) up to find her. He finds madly in love with her and his yearning and longing for her is described so wistfully and so ethereally that I could feel it. Which leads me to another point.
The prose in this book is magnificent, magical, enchanting, and otherwordly. Christina Henry's writing style is exquisite and incredibly atmospheric. Ok back to the story.
Amelia (as the mermaid decides to be called) and PT Barnum have a lot of conflict because he perceives himself as owning her but she is a wild creature and can not owned. This book goes beyond beyond a fairytale in that it takes a deep and profound look at how tamed women are expected to be. While of course, the times were more restrictive, I still see a lot of Amelia's observations on how women are expected to behave and how they are supposed to take a backseat to their husbands to still be true today. Her observations on society and how incredibly oppressive and inauthentic it is resonated deeply with me. When Levi says that she was so mysterious that he thought he would never know her because she was like the ocean, she responds that the ocean, and her, weren't so mysterious, you just had to be willing to delve deep below the surface. So much symbolism and philosophical truths in this book! And beautifully stated. I swooned.
The main theme of this book for me was yearning. The current of longing runs through all of the story and the subplots and is romanticized but made me feel wistful. I was nostalgic for something I could not name.
Beautifully written and filled with so many incredible quotes and metaphors that left me in awe. I loved the history, the story, the characters, the descriptions, the philosphy, the themes of feminism, yearning, wanderlust, and society, and the writing style....I feel as though I've left this world and coming back makes me feel disjointed. Ah...this book...<3
3.5
I was Interested in this... Its not a retelling Per se but has aspects that are....
It wasn't the usual grey Christina Henry writes but i still enjoyed it enough
I was Interested in this... Its not a retelling Per se but has aspects that are....
It wasn't the usual grey Christina Henry writes but i still enjoyed it enough
tense
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
No
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
In my library, this book was marked as part of "The Dark Chronicles" together with [book:Alice|23398606], its sequels, and [book:Lost Boy: The True Story of Captain Hook|32828538]: four books of the author that belong to the Horror Genre, with a lot of physical violence. Hence, that is what I expected from this book.
This book is not that, but I still enjoyed it.
The horror in this book comes with almost no physical violence, but mostly from the feeling of being trapped, and of your humanity being denied, which makes me want to categorize this book more in the genre of historical drama (and fantasy, of course, but that it has in common with the other books).
The "hook" of this book (aka it's first page) was a bit of a miss for me, but I still gave the book a chance for the sake of the author, whose other works I have liked so far, and I have not come to regret this. Following the journey of the mermaid on land and how she interacts with the world and the humans around her has brought me a lot of joy. Seeing her assert her agency and humanity (but also her non-humanity) in the face of people trying to deny her both of those things again and again, Levi's struggle with his conscience and feelings, the romance part of the plot: this book has a lot to offer.
This book is not that, but I still enjoyed it.
The horror in this book comes with almost no physical violence, but mostly from the feeling of being trapped, and of your humanity being denied, which makes me want to categorize this book more in the genre of historical drama (and fantasy, of course, but that it has in common with the other books).
The "hook" of this book (aka it's first page) was a bit of a miss for me, but I still gave the book a chance for the sake of the author, whose other works I have liked so far, and I have not come to regret this. Following the journey of the mermaid on land and how she interacts with the world and the humans around her has brought me a lot of joy. Seeing her assert her agency and humanity (but also her non-humanity) in the face of people trying to deny her both of those things again and again, Levi's struggle with his conscience and feelings, the romance part of the plot: this book has a lot to offer.
An interesting "fairy tale" telling of some real-life events. I really liked this one.