Fathomless (Fairy Tale Retelling) - Hardcover

Jackson Pearce is the author of Sisters Red, Sweetly, Purity, and As You Wish. She lives in Atlanta, Georgia.

Gr 9 Up-Anne, Jane, and Celia are no ordinary triplets. Anne can read a person's future; Jane, their present; and Celia, their past. The girls spend their days wandering the boardwalk of their coastal town and testing their powers on the tourists. Although Celia's sisters insist that they are "stronger together," she has always felt like the weakest link. However, when she meets Lo, a mysterious girl who lives in the ocean and has no recollection of her human life, she finally understands the value of her unique gift. They work together to unravel Lo's past; but the more Lo remembers, the more she'd like to forget. Chapters alternate between Lo's and Celia's perspectives as Lo struggles to understand who she is and Celia strives to form an identity separate from her sisters. This modern-day retelling of Hans Christian Andersen's "The Little Mermaid" plays up the dark side of the fairy tale; teens will find themselves both entranced and terrified by Pearce's world beneath the waves and the tension between the two protagonists once they begin fighting for the love of the same boy. Those who have read the author's other books will delight in the tie-ins, but familiarity with them is not necessary to follow the story. Fans of Frank Beddor's The Looking Glass Wars (Dial, 2006) and Marissa Meyer's Cinder (Feiwel & Friends, 2012) are likely to enjoy this quick-paced revamp.-Jennifer Furuyama, Pendleton Public Library, ORα(c) Copyright 2011. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.