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cassidy_99's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.0
Minor: Slavery and Murder
sydapel's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
4.0
Moderate: Slavery, Violence, Murder, and Pregnancy
pacifickat's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.25
However, there was a section toward the middle where
Ultimately this is a story about finding balance, between a traumatic past and a hopeful future, between individual and communal identity, between colonizing forces and indigenous cultures, and between the land and sea itself. It is also about remembering.
"Remember. […] That was all remembering was, prodding them lest they try to move on from things that should not be moved on from. Forgetting is not the same as healing.” - Yetu
"One can only go so long without asking, ‘Who am I? Where do I come from? What does all this mean? What is being? What came before me, and what might come after?’ Without answers there is only a hole, a whole where a history should be that takes the shape of an endless longing. We are cavities.” - Amamba
Yetu bears all of her people’s generational trauma, that is her role as ‘memory keeper’ in a society where long-term memory has largely been erased to give her people the freedom to thrive in the present unhindered by a painful past. She is their matriarch, but she is ill-suited for the role.
"She couldn’t determine which was worse, the pain of the ancestors or the pain of the living. Both fed off her.”
"She learned how to make an inch for herself.”
"She touched each one of them, figuring out how each Wajinru was outside of the oneness the remembrance brought. That mattered. Who each of them was mattered as much as who all of them were together.”
"They could bear it all together.”
It is also a story about the function of memory in culture-making and identity.
In the afterward, The Deep is described as “a game of cumulative telephone.” The concept began as a song and was adapted over time by different musical groups until this novelization was produced.
“Each new telling of The Deep has been productive rather than destructive, and each new iteration has been carried out with admiration for the previous, […] happily taking on adaptations of each new interpreter into the future.”
This is a wonderful description of culture-making, the turning of ‘I’ into ‘we’, of carrying our stories, traumas, and longings together, erasing loneliness in the context of a communal tribe. It is forming collective memory, adapting a shared history into a cohesive perspective, a meaningful and unifying mythology.
"The living put their own mark on the dead.”
Graphic: Blood, Colonisation, Death, Grief, Suicidal thoughts, Suicide attempt, War, Slavery, Toxic relationship, Murder, Injury/Injury detail, Kidnapping, Pregnancy, Trafficking, Violence, Self harm, and Sexual content
Moderate: Fire/Fire injury, Ableism, and Animal death
drowning, shark attacks, birth, biting, neurodivergence, generational trauma, collective traumakhakipantsofsex's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
3.5
Moderate: Murder, Suicide attempt, Self harm, and Slavery
viivacious's review against another edition
- Strong character development? Yes
3.0
Graphic: Death, Grief, Slavery, and Murder
miss_elease's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
4.0
- most compelling intro to a book I've read in a long time
- fucking brilliant afterword that is all the more appreciated after reading Afrofuturism: A History of Black Futures
- the juxtapositions and complications of one's relationship to time(s) is very well handled
Graphic: Violence, Murder, Grief, War, and Racism
Moderate: Suicide attempt and Suicidal thoughts
alexandryareads's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
5.0
Graphic: Slavery and Death
Moderate: Animal death and Murder
charrlee's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
5.0
"'What is belonging?' we ask.
She says, 'Where loneliness ends.'" (Solomon 49)
"How disorienting it is to go most of your life wondering about a thing, only to happen upon the answer, and it is a horror." (Solomon 57).
River Solomon's novella is profoundly atmospheric. I've never connected to a work so deeply and I will continue to be spellbound by Solomon's beautifully tragic narrative. Listen to "The Deep" by clipping. to see the inspiration and building of the mythos. I am thrilled for my future reread.
Graphic: Grief, Hate crime, Genocide, Murder, Child death, Racism, and Violence
Moderate: Death and Death of parent
savvylit's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.5
The Deep is a truly stunning novella. My only complaint is that the length of the story left me wanting more. I wanted more info on the Tidal Wars or Oori's family. The Deep was so immersive that I would have gladly stayed in its world for many more hours. Alas!
Graphic: Trafficking, Pregnancy, Genocide, Slavery, Suicidal thoughts, Racism, Murder, Grief, and Death
building_a_bookdom's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
4.0
Graphic: Animal death, Death, Eating disorder, Genocide, Grief, Mental illness, Slavery, Blood, Suicide attempt, Panic attacks/disorders, Self harm, Suicidal thoughts, Violence, War, and Abandonment
Moderate: Pregnancy, Confinement, Emotional abuse, Panic attacks/disorders, Racism, Child death, Murder, Gore, Injury/Injury detail, Mental illness, Body horror, Colonisation, and Death of parent