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3.83 AVERAGE
3.83 AVERAGE
adventurous
hopeful
fast-paced
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
adventurous
medium-paced
I am usually very bad with fantasy - I want to love it. I love folklore, but I struggle with world building a lot. It can be hard to remember how everything works in a world.
However, I didn't have any issue with this book. Very easy to follow the lore, in fact I could have had even more. Nevertheless I really enjoyed this fantasy lite pirate romp.
Flora and Evelyn are both relatable and lovable characters. I won't lie I was almost lost at the ending but it bought it back in a way that made me cry and give me the warm and fuzzies.
However, I didn't have any issue with this book. Very easy to follow the lore, in fact I could have had even more. Nevertheless I really enjoyed this fantasy lite pirate romp.
Flora and Evelyn are both relatable and lovable characters. I won't lie I was almost lost at the ending but it bought it back in a way that made me cry and give me the warm and fuzzies.
adventurous
medium-paced
One of the things I love about YA fiction is that it dares to tread in those places where adult fiction gets a bit nervous and skirts around the uncomfortable bits. This book is a prime example of that.
It is a love story, but it is also a story of identity, and belonging and how casting off expectations can help us discover our true selves, even if what we find might be scary and might alienate the people who would rather keep us locked in a little box of their own preconceptions.
It is a love story, but it is also a story of identity, and belonging and how casting off expectations can help us discover our true selves, even if what we find might be scary and might alienate the people who would rather keep us locked in a little box of their own preconceptions.
**Spoilers**
The Mermaid, the Witch, and the Sea by Maggie Tokuda-Hall is a fantasy romance story with representations such as queer and BIPOC characters. It follows the two main characters (and some side characters), Flora and Evelyn. Flora, a pirate on the Dove, and Evelyn, an imperial coming from luxury. Evelyn aboards the ship to be sailed away to her husband; however, the Dove is a pirate ship, not one to transport her to her husband. Flora gets assigned to take care of Evelyn until they can get rid of her. In this case, the two lovers start a blossoming romance.
TW: This book does contain some gore, homophobia, racism, misogyny, and slavery. Which, no, I don't like. Not to mention, it doesn't need to be in a fantasy world.
It does tend to lean on some historical facts of the time. For example, Flora or Florian, as we find out later that they are fluid moreso with gender - cannot read as most people who were not nobles couldn't read. Tokuda-Hall uses this as a way of their characters interacting with the world around them, setting not only world building but character personalities.
This book has also made some thoigh provoking points that made me think about who I was and what I believed.
This book is quite fast and is a character driven book; if that's not your cup of tea, I wouldn't recommend it for you. Also, with the trigger warnings above,
Fortunately for me, I am a fan of character driven books.
I give it a 4.5/5 stars.
The Mermaid, the Witch, and the Sea by Maggie Tokuda-Hall is a fantasy romance story with representations such as queer and BIPOC characters. It follows the two main characters (and some side characters), Flora and Evelyn. Flora, a pirate on the Dove, and Evelyn, an imperial coming from luxury. Evelyn aboards the ship to be sailed away to her husband; however, the Dove is a pirate ship, not one to transport her to her husband. Flora gets assigned to take care of Evelyn until they can get rid of her. In this case, the two lovers start a blossoming romance.
TW: This book does contain some gore, homophobia, racism, misogyny, and slavery. Which, no, I don't like. Not to mention, it doesn't need to be in a fantasy world.
It does tend to lean on some historical facts of the time. For example, Flora or Florian, as we find out later that they are fluid moreso with gender - cannot read as most people who were not nobles couldn't read. Tokuda-Hall uses this as a way of their characters interacting with the world around them, setting not only world building but character personalities.
This book has also made some thoigh provoking points that made me think about who I was and what I believed.
This book is quite fast and is a character driven book; if that's not your cup of tea, I wouldn't recommend it for you. Also, with the trigger warnings above,
Fortunately for me, I am a fan of character driven books.
I give it a 4.5/5 stars.
adventurous
emotional
funny
mysterious
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Plot
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
very enjoyable, cozy read.
SO (!!!) queer loved all the representation
not so sure i like the ending ot felt rushed, very abrupt and didnt make much sense to me. Was kinda hoping they all take down the empire together in some epic move but now it just seems like a story about some people who escaped it but didn't change anything about the injustice of this world. Which I find sad. Just escapism.
Like, imagine Evelyn gets turned into a mermaid and Flora stays a pirate/witch and together they smash the empire somehow. Would've been very satisfying. Very slay.
Also im fine with multiple Povs but 4 different ones plus the Sea interludes is a lot!
I don't like Rake as a person so I didn't enjoy his pov much and tbh didn't care much about him or any of the other Pirates or Imperials - except for Flora and Evelyn ofc
I also don't like Alfie, he seems selfish for the whole book so I like that at the end he let Flora go. I really like his development in that way.
Wished the storyline with Flora and the Witch would've been expanded more I really enjoyed that part and the magic system is so cool!!
Would've loved to see Flora become a real powerful witch. Also why did the Witch even teach her magic? What did she get out of it?
Also the whole mermaids being memories thing is very very creative I loved that.
SO (!!!) queer loved all the representation
Like, imagine Evelyn gets turned into a mermaid and Flora stays a pirate/witch and together they smash the empire somehow. Would've been very satisfying. Very slay.
Also im fine with multiple Povs but 4 different ones plus the Sea interludes is a lot!
I don't like Rake as a person so I didn't enjoy his pov much and tbh didn't care much about him or any of the other Pirates or Imperials - except for Flora and Evelyn ofc
I also don't like Alfie, he seems selfish for the whole book so I like that at the end he let Flora go. I really like his development in that way.
Wished the storyline with Flora and the Witch would've been expanded more I really enjoyed that part and the magic system is so cool!!
Would've loved to see Flora become a real powerful witch. Also why did the Witch even teach her magic? What did she get out of it?
Also the whole mermaids being memories thing is very very creative I loved that.
*MINOR SPOILERS*
This books has precise ambitions and fullifies them competently.
It creates the story of two teenagers that live in a magic and adventurous world with magic, mysterious sea creatures, an empire that is trying to swallow every other nation of the known world and a diverse range of possibility in terms of sexuality and sexual orientation. It is fresh, but not without references to known media (Avatar anyone?). The two leading ladies (I should say a lady and a genderfluid person) are proper teenagers with the problems a teenager might have in such a world.
I like the marine element that comes back again and again.
I don't like so much Genevieve's voice: why is she even there? Also, magic feels underutilise, I would have preferred Flora had had the chance to explore it a little longer. The way it is, it came across as a filler.
Is this a masterpiece that everyone should read? No. Does it give you a few hours of adventure, emotions and a compelling story -finally- two female identifying characters at the center of it? Yes. And that is all I was asking for.
(Ps: not taking anything away from Flora's gender here: the way I understood it, she identifies as female and male at the same time.)
This books has precise ambitions and fullifies them competently.
It creates the story of two teenagers that live in a magic and adventurous world with magic, mysterious sea creatures, an empire that is trying to swallow every other nation of the known world and a diverse range of possibility in terms of sexuality and sexual orientation. It is fresh, but not without references to known media (Avatar anyone?). The two leading ladies (I should say a lady and a genderfluid person) are proper teenagers with the problems a teenager might have in such a world.
I like the marine element that comes back again and again.
I don't like so much Genevieve's voice: why is she even there? Also, magic feels underutilise, I would have preferred Flora had had the chance to explore it a little longer. The way it is, it came across as a filler.
Is this a masterpiece that everyone should read? No. Does it give you a few hours of adventure, emotions and a compelling story -finally- two female identifying characters at the center of it? Yes. And that is all I was asking for.
(Ps: not taking anything away from Flora's gender here: the way I understood it, she identifies as female and male at the same time.)
I'm really sad that I didn't enjoy this more. In theory, the ideas are all great: mermaids as an extension of the Sea; the Sea as a larger-than-humans entity with real awareness; witches who tell stories; pirates; a feisty young noblewoman; genderfluid characters and multiple races and discussion of imperialism and colonialism!
Sadly, the execution does not quite match the ambition.
It felt like there were too many ellipses. Too many gaps where it seemed like the author skipped a step in the narrative - it was in her head but it didn't make it to paper. I'm pretty sure there was at least one mention of the storm having passed, with no prior mention of the storm. And this applied to some of the characters and relationships, too. Evelyn and Flora are both pretty well-developed characters, but their relationship really isn't. Mermaids are explained - how they exist - and this is probably my favourite part of the whole book; but witches aren't, nor how their magic works (is it innate? can anyone learn? no idea).
Moving between Evelyn and Flora as POV characters was fine - it made the narrative much more interesting than just one perspective, given the context. But all of a sudden introducing new perspectives quite late in the story was just weird, and put me quite off balance; and not in a good way. One of them made sense, narratively; it could have been added much earlier and would have added interesting complexity to the whole thing. The other, though, felt utterly superfluous.
On a positive note, the issues brought up in the story are dealt with well, and that's something I was impressed by. This is a world dominated by a Japanese-influenced culture (kimonos, etc); they have largely taken over the known world (this is another problem: there are these portentous 'oooh, the Red Shore' comments, without much explanation of what that place is). The brutality of colonisation and imperialism are bluntly on display and are an essential part of the world - not gratuitously, but as reality.
Excellent ideas; I was engaged enough that I kept reading the whole thing; ultimately, not very satisfying.
Sadly, the execution does not quite match the ambition.
It felt like there were too many ellipses. Too many gaps where it seemed like the author skipped a step in the narrative - it was in her head but it didn't make it to paper. I'm pretty sure there was at least one mention of the storm having passed, with no prior mention of the storm. And this applied to some of the characters and relationships, too. Evelyn and Flora are both pretty well-developed characters, but their relationship really isn't. Mermaids are explained - how they exist - and this is probably my favourite part of the whole book; but witches aren't, nor how their magic works (is it innate? can anyone learn? no idea).
Moving between Evelyn and Flora as POV characters was fine - it made the narrative much more interesting than just one perspective, given the context. But all of a sudden introducing new perspectives quite late in the story was just weird, and put me quite off balance; and not in a good way. One of them made sense, narratively; it could have been added much earlier and would have added interesting complexity to the whole thing. The other, though, felt utterly superfluous.
On a positive note, the issues brought up in the story are dealt with well, and that's something I was impressed by. This is a world dominated by a Japanese-influenced culture (kimonos, etc); they have largely taken over the known world (this is another problem: there are these portentous 'oooh, the Red Shore' comments, without much explanation of what that place is). The brutality of colonisation and imperialism are bluntly on display and are an essential part of the world - not gratuitously, but as reality.
Excellent ideas; I was engaged enough that I kept reading the whole thing; ultimately, not very satisfying.
This book suffers from having a concept far too cool for its execution.
The concept was, in fact, SO cool that even after seeing many 2-3 star reviews, I decided to give it a try. Sapphic pirates? Now that sounds like fun! And some of the pirate vibes WERE fun. I was interested in Rake as a character and liked seeing his perspective. I wanted more pirate conflicts, dynamics, etc. That part of the worldbuilding, along with the commentary on imperialism, was neat. I'll also say that this is titled aptly, because those three things are the best parts of the book. Loved the Sea's characterization as a violent and protective mother, and the mermaids as her daughters. LOVED that stories were the vehicle of magic. Wanted so much more of that.
Unfortunately, we just didn't get it. Why introduce such a cool magic system - and spend so much of the middle of the book on it - only to disregard it completely after a spell or two?
This book just seemed to drag on in general. This is probably because I didn't care about the characters in the slightest. It felt like there was a significant distance between the characters and the reader. I never got to understand, and therefore really care, about any of them. There's a certain disconnect in the tone that I can't get over.
Had our main characters been better developed and more sympathetic, they may have had a chance. Unfortunately, their romance was also terrible. They just kept saying they were in love, but never made me feel like they were. There was hardly any tension or buildup. Despite all their trials and tribulations, it somehow managed to feel like they weren't even tested, like their love just existed without any challenge or genuine feelings behind it. Even the most UHaul of lesbians have more romantic buildup and tension than this!!
Overall, I'm supremely disappointed (see what I did there? I kind of hate the Pirate Supreme as a name, honestly). It's almost to the point where I feel like I need to write queer pirates so this concept can exist as I wish it did. Guess I just have to figure out how it Should exist, huh?
The concept was, in fact, SO cool that even after seeing many 2-3 star reviews, I decided to give it a try. Sapphic pirates? Now that sounds like fun! And some of the pirate vibes WERE fun. I was interested in Rake as a character and liked seeing his perspective. I wanted more pirate conflicts, dynamics, etc. That part of the worldbuilding, along with the commentary on imperialism, was neat. I'll also say that this is titled aptly, because those three things are the best parts of the book. Loved the Sea's characterization as a violent and protective mother, and the mermaids as her daughters. LOVED that stories were the vehicle of magic. Wanted so much more of that.
Unfortunately, we just didn't get it. Why introduce such a cool magic system - and spend so much of the middle of the book on it - only to disregard it completely after a spell or two?
This book just seemed to drag on in general. This is probably because I didn't care about the characters in the slightest. It felt like there was a significant distance between the characters and the reader. I never got to understand, and therefore really care, about any of them. There's a certain disconnect in the tone that I can't get over.
Had our main characters been better developed and more sympathetic, they may have had a chance. Unfortunately, their romance was also terrible. They just kept saying they were in love, but never made me feel like they were. There was hardly any tension or buildup. Despite all their trials and tribulations, it somehow managed to feel like they weren't even tested, like their love just existed without any challenge or genuine feelings behind it. Even the most UHaul of lesbians have more romantic buildup and tension than this!!
Overall, I'm supremely disappointed (see what I did there? I kind of hate the Pirate Supreme as a name, honestly). It's almost to the point where I feel like I need to write queer pirates so this concept can exist as I wish it did. Guess I just have to figure out how it Should exist, huh?