Review – Drowning Mermaids

Title: Drowning Mermaids

Author: Nadia Scrieva

Genre: Fantasy

Publisher: CreateSpace

Publish Date: January 15, 2012

ISBN-10: 1469932733

Available at: Amazon – Barnes and Noble

Summary:

Aazuria lives deep under Arctic waters. She’s forced to regroup with her sisters in Alaska when danger of war looms over her ice kingdom.

Captain Trevain Murphy meets the mysterious Aazuria and invites her and her sisters into his home to live. What he doesn’t understand is that she’s not quite from his world and that he’ll have to open his mind and his heart to her.

Review*:

I wasn’t sure what I’d make of this book. I’ve read mermaid books before and they’ve disappointed me with unrealistic inconsistencies like talking underwater. This book surprised me. Instead of using vocal chords underwater, they use hand signals. I give full marks to the author for thinking that up.

I also liked the fact that instead of just using regular land guns underwater, she specified that they used underwater assault guns. It’s these types of attention to detail that make a book much more believable and easier to delve into.

Aazuria and her sisters were charming. They weren’t as multi-layered as they could have been but they were adequately portrayed. Each of them had their endearing qualities. Elandria was my favorite with the way she didn’t speak.  Corallyn was still sweet with her impish ways.

Trevain and Aazuria’s romance was different because of their seeming age difference. She appeared as a girl of eighteen or nineteen and he was fifty. She was in actuality something like six hundred years old. It was still a little odd because he kept acting fatherly towards her so I kept thinking of him as fatherly or avuncular. It took a little getting used to the apparent age difference and  I could have gotten over that.

What I didn’t like was the way Trevain got violent towards Aazuria. I wouldn’t have tolerated that type of behavior and I don’t think any woman should. I don’t see how that kind of thing can be forgiven or condoned without a thought. For Aazuria to simply forgive and forget is sending the wrong message no matter the context.

The story moved along at a nice pace and I had a good enough time with it. There wasn’t a whole lot of action in the beginning of the book but there was enough happening to keep me interested. The end was rather too neat and pat. It led into the next book rather too predictably. It was still mostly an enjoyable and fun read, but I doubt I’ll look for the next book in the series. Mostly because the violence towards Aazuria by Trevain turned me off so much.

*I received a free copy of this book for an honest review.

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