Hello everyone!
As I've said before, I'm a member on BookSirens, a growing community of writers and reviewers where you can browse through BUNCHES of ARCs and pick and choose which ones you want to read.
It really is that simple.
The only rule of thumb is that you can only start off with one book and need to read it within a given time frame, but as most of those frames are about three months long, I'm pretty sure anyone can meet the deadlines. Once you've proven yourself as faithful, the number of books you can pick increases, and away you go!
I usually have at least three books borrowed from BookSirens at any given time because there's just SO MANY FANTASTIC works and authors on there. And tonight's blog pick is one of those.
I did download it before the holidays started, but in the end needed to wait until after to finally start reading it.
I don't regret it being my first 2021 pick, however. Siren's Call is just that good.
I don't think I have anything remotely like what Siren's Call is on my blog post at the moment, nor have I actually ever heard of Clementine Fraser before BookSiren's system suggested the book to me by algorithm after reading a few other fantasy-like novels.
And boy, am I glad I did!
The title basically says almost all: this books is about mermaids.
But not about the cute, singing ones like Ariel in The Little Mermaid, oh no.
This one is about Mer people, about Sirens - who have sharp, pointy teeth and some form of magic and are brilliant warriors underwater, and generally speaking don't like humans all that much.
Initially we're introduced to the story through the eyes of two of them, sisters Sariana and Amatheia, who are searching for their brother, apparently someone who's working with humans that have set up some sort of research station called the Dome under the sea, and are now trying to piece together how they and the Mer could benefit from one another.
Unfortunately, the brother dies, which prompts Sariana into action, but we don't get to see exactly what that is until a bit later.
First, we meet our human counterpart, Evan.
A retired Marine who has just been dumped by his girlfriend because she couldn't handle his PTSD episodes, Evan joins his friend Daniel Kim (a Korean scientist of sorts and I'm CONVINCED a tribute to actual Korean actor Daniel Dae Kim, not that it's ever confirmed, but it is super cool if true!) on a sea expedition that goes from boring to WHAT THE HELL IS HAPPENING in about a heartbeat.
By this I mean one minute there's calm seas and clear skies, and the next a storm rolls in, capsizes the boat, and chucks everyone off into the depths. Evan gets rescued by Amatheia, but she eventually knocks him out before the people from the Dome find him and take him in.
He's skeptical of the entire operation throughout the book, even in the very beginning, because he's got some bad experiences from fighting the war topside already and doesn't trust when someone says he'd be fighting for the 'greater good' if he stayed and helped. However, as he literally has nothing better in his life at the moment, he eventually signs a contract to become a member of the Dome, after noticing a lot of former soldiers and members of other military branches - and this blonde woman named Ana who takes his breath away.
He begins his training which includes but isn't limited to regular physical training and tests you'd get above sea level as well, but also goes into territory like how long can you hold your breath underwater and fighting in the water, etc. (hint: Evan nearly drowns during the holding breath underwater exercise, but Ana saves him; he also suffers from a bad PTSD episode during an activity, but his friend Char helps him through it).
Initially there doesn't seem to be anything specifically wrong, other than a couple of bullies led by a guy named Blake who bore Evan to tears, but eventually he starts noticing things, like people disappearing and never coming back.
So as he never really trusted the Dome and higher ups to begin with he goes to do some snooping, and eventually finds the missing ones - being lab rats and injected with some weird stuff that has started turning them into Mer, or part-Mer, but they aren't responding well. Horrified, especially because others like Char and Khalid, another friend made, have known about this but do nothing, Evan eventually goes back and ends the suffering of the friends in the labs.
He also gets called up to the Siren's office, the woman who runs the entire operation, where he's told they basically now own him through the contract he signed, and if he plans on doing anything his sister will suffer.
The threat only works in one direction: telling Evan he needs to find a way out, so he starts plotting and pulls Char into the thing as well, while at the same time somehow finding holes in his busy schedule to start a romance with Ana along the way.
Remember Ana?
Or better yet, remember Sariana? Because she's infiltrated the Dome and is spying for the Mer within, and Evan is shocked to learn he's fallen in love with one of the Mer. Their relationship goes thorugh a few realistic ups and downs (how do you react when the person you've had sex with reveals themselves to have more teeth than you can count and fins???) but eventually agree they have to figure out a way to stop the Dome, as they've started experimenting on children (Ana rescues him, by the way).
Even while Evan's plotting this, he's pulled into the experiments himself, and to everyone's intense surprise not only survives, but takes to the changes in him, the mutated blood making him part-Mer and enabling him to see better underwater, breathe underwater, that sort of thing.
This prompts Ana to take him to her Enclave, the council of Mer leading her people, where he not only promises that he wants to stop the experiments - as the Mer didn't know humans are also being toyed with - but also asks whether any of his friends from the original wreck survived. This is how Amatheia keys a rock to him so he can find Dan, who is apparently alive, so Evan, Char and Ana take off to do just that.
And they do find Dan.
Only for Ana to shoot him.
Because, SURPRISE SUCKERS! She turns out to be the Siren, and she's been the one behind the entire thing since her brother died and she first infiltrated the Dome. Initially wanting to bring it down, she's now turned in another direction, one where she could possibly turn more humans Mer and thus enable her own people to take over, wrest control from humans as a whole, and never have to cower in fear again.
... but she's also the one who allowed experiments on children in the first place. So the line for her is so far back it doesn't even exist anymore.
And after shooting at Char, wounding her, Evan is done with the woman he's fallen in love with, as painful as it is. In a race against time, knowing that once Ana comes back to the Dome it'll be an all-out manhunt for them, Evan orders Char to evacuate the building while he goes to bring it down, only to run right into a Mer attack on the outside, as they're enraged that their children have been taken.
Finally revealing that the experiments have worked WONDERS on him, much more than initially thought as he's capable of controlling energy just like a regular Mer, Evan promises to find the children after telling the Mer the truth, that it was Sariana who actually betrayed them.
Following the carnage of the special team who went in to find the kids, it's Evan who ends up finding and rescuing them, though they do run into Ana in the process, and she's so far gone in her delusions that Evan can hardly believe she's the same woman he made love with, though she does help him with the children, at the extent of what seems to be her own life.
Evan has Char bring down the Dome and the lot of them take off; it turns out only Evan and Char are wanted for crimes in the US so the rest of them can go home, but the two of them settle in South America, where the remnants of their families eventually join them.
Evan keeps Ana's amulet, the one that initially enabled her to breathe above water and change into a human - even though she eventually didn't need it anymore because she was the first on who the transmorphing experiment actually worked - and meets with Ana in the evening when she walks out of the sea onto the beach.
She explains her sister found her and rescued her from the collapsed Dome, but then banished her because of the truth of what had happened, so the Mer would have killed her if she stayed, and the Dome has polluted waters even further. But her feelings for Evan have always been real, and she asks him to join her in the deep, as he is Mer now, too. Evan tells her no, as much as it pains him, and she says she'll wait - and this is the first and only time in the books where we get to hear a Siren's mournful song as she returns to the sea, and Evan returns to his own make-shift home and family, where he feels at peace for the first time in a long, long time.
But his heart still calls him to the sea - and the question whether or not he'll answer that call remains unanswered.
For now.
FIN!
This was a FANTASTIC book to start off 2021 with.
The premise is fairly simple, really: if humanity knew about a different race sharing their planet - a race of humanoids, mind, with similar characteristics to ourselves - would we be willing to work with them, or would it turn into some sort of Jurassic Park meets Deep Blue Sea concept of dog eats dog kind of world?
This is at the heart of Siren's Call.
What happens when two species meet - when it becomes clear they aren't equal, but neither can overcome the other. Can they work together? Or will one try to overpower the other?
And more importantly, what cost is each side willing to pay to achieve their goals?
In the middle of all this we get the obligatory love story between a human and a Mer, but with a twist at the end I didn't see coming - and I've read so many books at this point I'd have thought nothing could surprise me anymore. But WOW did this shock me! I never would have imagined Ana as the Siren, but it's an interesting predicament to push a character so far beyond the jagged lines and experiment what this means for them and those around them. It's a brilliant character study, but then again this is true for ALL the book.
The characters in Siren's Call are really well done, each with their own motivations, their own lines they don't want to cross, but some feel those lines more deeply than others. What happens, then, when one of those involves crosses the line, so deep into it that they don't even know where it began? When they begin to believe that it's the only choice, the only way out, what do you do then?
When you love them?
There's so much to unpack in Siren's Call that it's almost impossible to summarize in one simple review. It was sci-fi, yes, it was fantasy, also yes, but equally it was action, it was romance, it was a little bit of magic, and it was The Little Mermaid come to life in a more vivid picture, a darker representation, than before. I loved it. I also REALLY loved the way the Mer were described and presented, the descriptions flowed wonderfully, the way their tails changed colour according to their moods and how different colours showed different representations, which remind me a lot of Star Wars and Naboo, where different colours had different meanings.
There were some minor errors here or there, and I would've liked to know a bit more in-depth about the contracts, which seem a big deal in this book, but I couldn't quite figure out exactly why or how; some kind of magic binds you once you sign it, as if you're making a deal with the Devil and signing away your soul, because we learn that another Mer signed a contract that prevented him from changing into his Mer form again and returning to the sea, out of love for a human woman (a love story that serves as a warning, mind); other than that this is a stellar read. Between Evan and Ana, and all the supporting cast, from Amatheia to Char and Khalid, I believe every reader can find someone to attach to.
Best of all, the author has said there IS a sequel in the works, so I'm REALLY looking forward to that!
10/10, would recommend.
The premise is fairly simple, really: if humanity knew about a different race sharing their planet - a race of humanoids, mind, with similar characteristics to ourselves - would we be willing to work with them, or would it turn into some sort of Jurassic Park meets Deep Blue Sea concept of dog eats dog kind of world?
This is at the heart of Siren's Call.
What happens when two species meet - when it becomes clear they aren't equal, but neither can overcome the other. Can they work together? Or will one try to overpower the other?
And more importantly, what cost is each side willing to pay to achieve their goals?
In the middle of all this we get the obligatory love story between a human and a Mer, but with a twist at the end I didn't see coming - and I've read so many books at this point I'd have thought nothing could surprise me anymore. But WOW did this shock me! I never would have imagined Ana as the Siren, but it's an interesting predicament to push a character so far beyond the jagged lines and experiment what this means for them and those around them. It's a brilliant character study, but then again this is true for ALL the book.
The characters in Siren's Call are really well done, each with their own motivations, their own lines they don't want to cross, but some feel those lines more deeply than others. What happens, then, when one of those involves crosses the line, so deep into it that they don't even know where it began? When they begin to believe that it's the only choice, the only way out, what do you do then?
When you love them?
There's so much to unpack in Siren's Call that it's almost impossible to summarize in one simple review. It was sci-fi, yes, it was fantasy, also yes, but equally it was action, it was romance, it was a little bit of magic, and it was The Little Mermaid come to life in a more vivid picture, a darker representation, than before. I loved it. I also REALLY loved the way the Mer were described and presented, the descriptions flowed wonderfully, the way their tails changed colour according to their moods and how different colours showed different representations, which remind me a lot of Star Wars and Naboo, where different colours had different meanings.
There were some minor errors here or there, and I would've liked to know a bit more in-depth about the contracts, which seem a big deal in this book, but I couldn't quite figure out exactly why or how; some kind of magic binds you once you sign it, as if you're making a deal with the Devil and signing away your soul, because we learn that another Mer signed a contract that prevented him from changing into his Mer form again and returning to the sea, out of love for a human woman (a love story that serves as a warning, mind); other than that this is a stellar read. Between Evan and Ana, and all the supporting cast, from Amatheia to Char and Khalid, I believe every reader can find someone to attach to.
Best of all, the author has said there IS a sequel in the works, so I'm REALLY looking forward to that!
10/10, would recommend.
xx
*image not mine
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