So wahnsinnig düster fand ich das jetzt nicht... Aber wirklich gut geschrieben und eine tolle Geschichte! ( )

Another great story from Christina.

I certainly feel rewarded for reading 'The Little Mermaid' and 'The Fabulous Showman' before diving straight into this, as they do give one the feeling and attitude of the age and thereby give this story a sense of genuine realism.   So i would certainly recommend reading both before hand if you're looking for a more immersive experience from this story.

Reading a work of fiction that contains real historical characters, in their real historical places and time, while only twisting the factual narrative where needed to make the fictional narrative fit was, at times, quite emotionally disturbing.   One can truly feel for Amelia as though she is a genuine historical person, because all the people around her were genuine historical people.

For example...   Barnum did put a huge tank into the museum, but he put whales in it.   And the way in which he treats the mermaid in this story is not too dissimilar to how he treated the whales.   One can almost read this story as the story of those whales, and have Amelia's voice speak for them.   Sadly, the whales never had a voice, nor did they have someone like Levi to champion their corner, and all suffered and died serving the ignorance of the masses and Barnum's bank account.   It made me feel genuinely uncomfortable, and moved in ways that an ordinary work of fiction simply doesn't.   It's quite the experience, and one i certainly recommend.

As with all of Christina's books, the writing is wonderful, flowing, and, for me, perfectly edited.   A wonderful read.   It really does capture the feeling and attitude of the age.

Christina's next book 'The Girl in Red' is out on 18th June 2019.   I'm so looking forward to having a 'Little Red Riding Hood' journey. ( )

A fantastical take on P. T. Barnum’s Feejee Mermaid hoax.

It’s the classic tale of the curious mermaid who gets caught in a fisherman’s net and becomes his wife. But there is no coercion, only love. They live their lives together in a cottage by the sea, until the sea claims the life of the old fisherman.

But that is only the beginning of the mermaid’s story. What happens next, when she is not yet ready to return to the water, now that land is more home to her than the sea, but the person who made it home is no longer there?

She decides she will travel the world, see all the sights she wanted to see when she first came to the surface. But for that, she will need money.

Enter P. T. Barnum with the perfect business opportunity for her.

I could see where this was going from the beginning, knowing Barnum’s character, but I was pleasantly surprised by how effectively Amelia (the mermaid) was able to stand up for herself, in spite of her naivety when it comes to the human world. I was also happy to see how many allies she had who were also willing to stand up to Barnum on her behalf, so it ended up being less of a story about her trying to escape his clutches and more about her using her time in his museum to figure out what she wants in the next phase of her life. Love it! ( )

3.25/5 ( )

This book was so good. When I put the "made-me-cry" tag on it I don't mean the ending made me a bit teary-eyed as endings often do, I mean crying as in "any book ever written by Fredrik Backman". Pretty much every time Jack was mentioned I ended up like the crying emoji. Honestly, I was still hoping he'd show up as some sort of immortal mermaid by the end, though I knew it wouldn't happen.

Anyway, me PMSing aside, it's a really great book. I loved this take on mermaids (especially one detail at the end) and it was such an interesting setting, with the 1800s New York and fucking PT Barnum. I mean, I loved The Greatest Showman as much as any stra8 or bisexual woman who has ever laid eyes on Hugh Jackman, but it was definitely rewriting history and even if this wasn't exactly historically accurate, I liked seeing a less nice version of Barnum.

The ending was a little rushed maybe, and not where I thought the book would go in the beginning, but I liked it. Clearly this mermaid is going to live for a long time and I'm hoping that she will, eventually, get to see all the wonders of the world. ( )