With the live-action Little Mermaid in theatres, mermaids are on my mind! Are they on yours too? While they are often depicted as beautiful and sweet in pop culture and children's fiction, these mythic creatures may haunt your nightmares after reading these three speculative fiction titles. Bonus: included are some relevant categories to help you with this year's Book Bingo!
The Salt Grows Heavy by Cassandra Khaw (2023)
A mermaid incapable of speech and a plague doctor are the lone survivors of a vicious hunger that devoured the kingdom. Together they set off to find a new community and stumble upon a cult of monstrous children who are being (mis)guided by surgeons seeking immortality. A feast of body horror and gore, this novella is a poetic and visceral meditation on bodies, violence, and love. As the Tor review quotes, "there is nothing wrong with being a monster."
Book Bingo Category Suggestions
Sea creatures
Trans or nonbinary author
BIPOC or LGBTQIA+ horror
Same author, different genre (they also write urban fantasy and science fiction)
The Deep by Rivers Solomon (2019)
The mermaids (wajinru) on these pages descend from enslaved, pregnant Africans who were thrown overboard. In order to survive without the burden of this trauma, the wajinru elected to store all their memories in an historian. Yetu is the current historian and is struggling. During the annual ceremony of memory sharing, Yetu discards the history and escapes to the surface. When Yetu meets two-legger Oori, she learns the context of her history – but at what cost? Evocative and lyrical prose guide the reader through this atmospheric and devastating novella.
Book Bingo Category Suggestions:
Sea creatures
Trans or nonbinary author
Into the Drowning Deep by Mira Grant (2017)
Reader beware! You may find yourself more cautions on ferries and other ships after reading this fast-paced, suspenseful horror novel. Found footage from a documentary chasing mermaids in the Mariana Trench surfaced a brutal attack on a crew, none of whom survived. Seven years later, a scientific dream-team will attempt the voyage again. Will any of them survive? Who is the ultimate predator – human or mermaid?
Book Bingo Category Suggestions:
Local author
Sea creatures
BIPOC or LGBTQIA+ horror
Same author, different genre (Mira Grant is the science fiction pen name of Seanan McGuire, a fantasy author)
~Genesee R.
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