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A review by eyeowna
The Salt Grows Heavy by Cassandra Khaw
dark
tense
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? N/A
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? N/A
- Flaws of characters a main focus? N/A
3.0
Fever dream of a horror (and romance?) novella that is loosely a Little Mermaid retelling with a lot of plague doctor and Frankenstein-monster stuff added in. Some lovely writing. A lot of words for like the SAT or something (I have a nice list of new words now! Thank you for expanding my vocab, Khaw). Would not recommend unless you like body horror weirdness.
I personally loved it when the mermaid ate people. And also the descriptions of mermaid memories.
I mean just read THIS: “I allow myself, for the gash of a moment, to remember what I once possessed: the abyssal ocean, the song in those depths like swimming down the black throat of a god; the searing colors moting my sisters’ coils, sapphire and quartz crushed into constellations, patterns and prisms of incandescence spiraling through the dark, our tails in endless, restless motion; our mother’s eyes colossal, phosphorescent; our father’s ribs, still studded with our egg sacs, his heartbeat in our veins. I’d been happy there. I could have been happy there forever” (page 59 ebook edition).
I mean just read THIS: “I allow myself, for the gash of a moment, to remember what I once possessed: the abyssal ocean, the song in those depths like swimming down the black throat of a god; the searing colors moting my sisters’ coils, sapphire and quartz crushed into constellations, patterns and prisms of incandescence spiraling through the dark, our tails in endless, restless motion; our mother’s eyes colossal, phosphorescent; our father’s ribs, still studded with our egg sacs, his heartbeat in our veins. I’d been happy there. I could have been happy there forever” (page 59 ebook edition).
Content Warnings
Graphic: Body horror