A review by howlintherain
Deep Blue by Jennifer Donnelly

1.0

I was unfortunately unable to finish this book. I got about 100 pages in before I decided that I simply wasn't enjoying it enough to continue, which is a huge disappointment for me. The largest, most glaring flaw (in my opinion) is one that is built at a structural level. I feel like the author just took human culture, stuck it underwater, and added some nautical-themed slang (there was a lot of random Latin thrown in that was explicitly stated as Latin??? and I get that this is YA, but what the heck are the logistics of mermaids wearing very human sounding clothes????). I didn't feel like I was reading about another species and there wasn't the type of creativity and world building that I expect from this type of fantasy. If this story was set above ground featuring humans, and I didn't go in with that expectation I might have enjoyed it better, but, as it stands now, the underwater setting just seems wholly unnecessary. Other than that, the book was alright. Not spectacular, but if you want to read it with my review in mind I won't stop you.