Reality intrudes more than once, such as when one of the teens is presented with a white classmate’s utterly inappropriate comments concerning her hair and another must pull her car over to the side of the road, terrified, as two police officers approach.
In a split narrative, one teenager trains to be a mermaid while another struggles to control her magical voice. More significantly, it is the story of two young Black women and the efforts of an America remarkably like our own to silence, trample, and even casually destroy them. (Scratch that – it’s impossible to sum up in a few words.) On one level, it is very much a story of sirens and mermaids (and gargoyles, elokos, and pixies) and a version of America that both recognizes and acknowledges the existence of such mythic creatures.
Morrow ( Tor Teen 978-2-8, $17.99, 288pp, hc) June 2020.īethany Morrow’s A Song Below Water is a difficult novel to sum up in a few words.
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