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3.55 AVERAGE
3.55 AVERAGE
Half of my childhood is destroyed. The remaining half feels scandalously badass! Contests on another success Pearce!
This third installment of Pearce's fairytale adaptations doesn't disappoint. If you've read the 2 earlier books there three novels are beginning to come together in unexpected ways. In this tale we follow Celia, a triplet, with special abilities to touch people and see their pasts. When she encounters Lo, a strange ocean-girl, on the beach after a boy tumbles off the pier she is consumed by curiosity about Lo and her past.
A clever, twist on the Little Mermaid story that avoids all the usual tropes, Jackson's take on mermaid mythology is clever and refreshing, and her prose makes for a quick and riveting read.
I am a sucker for mermaids so this book was interesting to me and it was a short, easy read.
But like wtf was that ending... The explanation was SO random to me but that's likely my fault since I didn't read the other books in this series/
But like wtf was that ending... The explanation was SO random to me but that's likely my fault since I didn't read the other books in this series/
Umm. So. I have really enjoyed how this "series" doesn't constrain itself by trying hard to fit in every fairy tale detail in some contrived way. And each book has gotten better at that, since they're only really inspired by tales, not based on them, and that's nice, because retellings get old. Like this latest one is much more a sequel looking at who the Sisters of the Air might be instead of retelling The Little Mermaid.
That said, there's a lot of stuff here that is sooo random. Triplets with magical powers what? And who are we rooting for, Lo or Naida? Because that seems to be inconsistent. Also, this book felt way too much like it was trying to be [b:Lost Voices|7656222|Lost Voices (Lost Voices, #1)|Sarah Porter|http://d.gr-assets.com/books/1286695920s/7656222.jpg|10230258], and I don't read Jackson Pearce when I need a literary fix, because that's not her thing. And because the writing seemed to be striving for that instead of being like the first two books, it fell short, because it didn't actually work. In the end I didn't care for any of the characters or their problems, because everything about this book was so random, and unlike the first two, which work both together and alone, this one felt much more like I needed a family tree and a timeline to make sense of the greater story at work, and I shouldn't have to do that to read a book.
Very meh. Also, damn you, publishers, for not doing the cool covers anymore and bowing down to the gods of ridiculous frilly YA covers! Now I wish I hadn't given people my copies of the first two books, because I won't get those covers back.
That said, there's a lot of stuff here that is sooo random. Triplets with magical powers what? And who are we rooting for, Lo or Naida? Because that seems to be inconsistent. Also, this book felt way too much like it was trying to be [b:Lost Voices|7656222|Lost Voices (Lost Voices, #1)|Sarah Porter|http://d.gr-assets.com/books/1286695920s/7656222.jpg|10230258], and I don't read Jackson Pearce when I need a literary fix, because that's not her thing. And because the writing seemed to be striving for that instead of being like the first two books, it fell short, because it didn't actually work. In the end I didn't care for any of the characters or their problems, because everything about this book was so random, and unlike the first two, which work both together and alone, this one felt much more like I needed a family tree and a timeline to make sense of the greater story at work, and I shouldn't have to do that to read a book.
Very meh. Also, damn you, publishers, for not doing the cool covers anymore and bowing down to the gods of ridiculous frilly YA covers! Now I wish I hadn't given people my copies of the first two books, because I won't get those covers back.
3.75 stars
I loved how dark and gritty this book was.
I loved how dark and gritty this book was.
Spoiler
I also really enjoyed the ending of this book and that it isn't your typical happily ever after.
I keep thinking that "of course the stories aren't connected"!
AND THEN BAM
"That name sounds familiar..."
Okay.
Let's just say I LOVE THE WHOLE SERIES.
One more book to go! :)
AND THEN BAM
"That name sounds familiar..."
Okay.
Let's just say I LOVE THE WHOLE SERIES.
One more book to go! :)
I don’t even want to talk about that cover, okay? I know. I know.
What I don’t know is why I waited so long to read a Jackson Pearce book. Seriously. I follow her on Twitter, I love her videos, and the premises of her books sounds exactly like my kind of book. I even own all three of the fairytale books! Finally cracking open Fathomless was extremely rewarding and I am Pearce’s newest fan now.
Fathomless is loosely based on Hans Christian Anderson’s The Little Mermaid. I really loved that Pearce took the tale back to its origins: this is not the happy singing mermaids and flounders, or handsome princes rescuing damsels in distress. No. This is girls-turned-sea creature, soul stealing sirens, where walking on land cuts like a knife and your humanity might just be lost forever. Pearce effortlessly twines together the story of Lo, an ocean girl, waiting out the rest of her days at the bottom of the sea until she’s old enough to become an angel, with the story of Celia, the youngest in a set of triplets with the power to see your past.
This book was just… there are no words for how beautifully it was written. The language Pearce used really captured the depth of the ocean and how unyielding it is. Instead the colorful frivolity of our familiar Ariel and Sebastian, we’re met with cold, unseeing eyes of the old ones, an uncaring ocean, a vastness that is of course, fathomless. Lo was the perfect personification of the sea. She was slowly being beaten down, like a pebble, until all her old memories and surface differences and her old self was gone, and she was completely smooth.
Then there is Celia. Celia and her sisters Anne and Jane, each have a power: Anne sees your future, Jane can know your now and Celia can see your past. The only reason I docked a star off of Fathomless was because there was no explanation for the powers the three sisters had, and there was hardly any characterization of them. But I really loved Celia. Right from the beginning was can see that there is a line dividing her from her sisters – she wants to be more than just Jane and Anne’s sister, she wants to use her power to help someone instead of just tricking them into buying her dinner.
The entire book read like a fairytale, which I guess was the point. There was beautiful imagery of a sunken ship where Lo and her sisters lived, and of course the waves crushing the shore, the storm that steals the girls and rips them up to the surface to turn to angels. And as soon as Celia and Lo meet, there is a mystery. Who brought the girls to sea, and why? Do they really turn to angels? And who was Lo before she was Lo, when she was still a girl who lived on land?
So many things were up in the air, and I was definitely guessing the whole way through. There is a romance, and it does play a pretty big part in the story. But instead of the story being about the romance, the romance was about the story – if that makes any sense at all. Every piece was so interwoven to the others that it’s hard to pull out one thread and thoroughly explain it, without the whole thing unraveling.
Fathomless by Jackson Pearce is the perfect fairytale retelling. The writing is gorgeous, with haunting imagery, and the characters are so fresh and inspired. I loved getting to know the real Lo, Celia outside of her sisters, and Jane and Anne outside of Celia’s prejudices. Reading this made me an instant Pearce fan.
What I don’t know is why I waited so long to read a Jackson Pearce book. Seriously. I follow her on Twitter, I love her videos, and the premises of her books sounds exactly like my kind of book. I even own all three of the fairytale books! Finally cracking open Fathomless was extremely rewarding and I am Pearce’s newest fan now.
Fathomless is loosely based on Hans Christian Anderson’s The Little Mermaid. I really loved that Pearce took the tale back to its origins: this is not the happy singing mermaids and flounders, or handsome princes rescuing damsels in distress. No. This is girls-turned-sea creature, soul stealing sirens, where walking on land cuts like a knife and your humanity might just be lost forever. Pearce effortlessly twines together the story of Lo, an ocean girl, waiting out the rest of her days at the bottom of the sea until she’s old enough to become an angel, with the story of Celia, the youngest in a set of triplets with the power to see your past.
This book was just… there are no words for how beautifully it was written. The language Pearce used really captured the depth of the ocean and how unyielding it is. Instead the colorful frivolity of our familiar Ariel and Sebastian, we’re met with cold, unseeing eyes of the old ones, an uncaring ocean, a vastness that is of course, fathomless. Lo was the perfect personification of the sea. She was slowly being beaten down, like a pebble, until all her old memories and surface differences and her old self was gone, and she was completely smooth.
Her soul was gone for good. The boy was dead, the girl left alone on the shore. And for nothing, nothing at all, other than a fairy tale and a few scattered memories of life on land. Let it go. Let it all go.
And she allowed herself to forget.
Then there is Celia. Celia and her sisters Anne and Jane, each have a power: Anne sees your future, Jane can know your now and Celia can see your past. The only reason I docked a star off of Fathomless was because there was no explanation for the powers the three sisters had, and there was hardly any characterization of them. But I really loved Celia. Right from the beginning was can see that there is a line dividing her from her sisters – she wants to be more than just Jane and Anne’s sister, she wants to use her power to help someone instead of just tricking them into buying her dinner.
The entire book read like a fairytale, which I guess was the point. There was beautiful imagery of a sunken ship where Lo and her sisters lived, and of course the waves crushing the shore, the storm that steals the girls and rips them up to the surface to turn to angels. And as soon as Celia and Lo meet, there is a mystery. Who brought the girls to sea, and why? Do they really turn to angels? And who was Lo before she was Lo, when she was still a girl who lived on land?
So many things were up in the air, and I was definitely guessing the whole way through. There is a romance, and it does play a pretty big part in the story. But instead of the story being about the romance, the romance was about the story – if that makes any sense at all. Every piece was so interwoven to the others that it’s hard to pull out one thread and thoroughly explain it, without the whole thing unraveling.
Fathomless by Jackson Pearce is the perfect fairytale retelling. The writing is gorgeous, with haunting imagery, and the characters are so fresh and inspired. I loved getting to know the real Lo, Celia outside of her sisters, and Jane and Anne outside of Celia’s prejudices. Reading this made me an instant Pearce fan.