Waterfell (Aquarathi, #1)

by Amalie Howard

THE DEEP CAN BE DEADLY…BUT LOVE CAN BE DEADLIER

Nerissa Marin is far from home. Though she lives an anonymous life on land during her cycle of human study, she is Aquarathi royalty by birth—and the future monarch of a hidden, undersea kingdom. But when her father is murdered, the human world becomes her only refuge.

Adrift and indifferent, Riss indulges her every whim, including her feelings for the new surf king of Dover Prep, Lokeane Seavon. But as the day she comes of age looms closer, old enemies appear and challenges are issued: If she forsakes her throne, her people will suffer for it.

To win her crown, she must become the queen she was born to be.

• ISBN10: 0996958460
• ISBN13: 9780996958462
• Publish Date: 29 October 2013 (first published 1 January 2013)
• Publish Status: Active
• Imprint: Rah Media LLC
• Format: Paperback (US Trade)
• Pages: 334
• Language: English

Reviews

[ellieroth]

1.5

La mitología siempre me ha gustado, en especial las sirenas, nunca leí nada sobre ellas, por lo que tenía unas ganas ENORMES de leer Waterfell, hay otras series de sirenas muy famosas, sólo que no he sentido esas ganas de leerlas. Sobre todo me ha dolido el no gustarme es porque la escritora me cae bien, hace unos meses me llegaron unos bookmarks muy bonitos.

¿Qué es lo que no me gustó del libro?

La protagonista, el insta love, la historia. Continué leyéndolo porque tenía la esperanza que en algún momento algunos de los personajes/amigos de Nerissa, la protagonista, la pusiera en su sitio. Nunca pasó. Entiendo que ella sea la próxima monarca y esté en peligro y quiera su vida, pero hay un nivel de egoísmo en los libros que aguanto, eso también tiene que ver en como un escritor nos presenta las situaciones para gustar de ellos, lamentablemente las escenas del libro en dónde supuestamente debemos sentirnos conectados con Nerissa, entender sus decisiones y egoísmo, lo único que hizo fue agrandar mi desagrado por ella. Es curioso porque por lo general tiendo a gustar de personajes un poco egoístas, por ejemplo la protagonista de Heartbeat fue acusada de eso y amé el libro, o en "La dulce venganza de Celia Door" dónde sí, Celia es bastante egocéntrica pero a mí el libro me pareció bastante simpático. Así que no es exactamente mi "odio" por este tipo de personaje.

Luego viene el insta love + lo poco gustable que fue Nerissa: Cuando digo insta-love, me refiero AL INSTALOVE, como en el primer capítulo, casi primera página, se conocen y caen enamorados. Lo, el chico nuevo y misterioso, obviamente, con sus ojos azules que no son azules, es todo lo que ella quiere pero no debe, y créanme que repite eso una cantidad bastante grande. No me creí para nada este amorío, sobre todo porque es muy fácil detectar por dónde va la historia por lo que para mí no hubo sorpresa alguna.

Mi problema ha sido completamente con Nerissa, solo no. Hay personajes que amas odiar y otros que solo no quieres pensar en ellos.

¿Algo positivo?

Sí. El reino acuático no era exactamente lo que esperaba, si bien la Nerissa como personaje no me gustó, lo qué es, su especie se me hizo muy interesante, hay algunas inconsistencias, pero no fue lo que esperaba. Y el otro fue el twist de los malos malotes.

Conclusión - ¿Recomiendo el libro a alguien? Depende. Por ejemplo si amaste con pasión y locura la serie Inmortales de Alyson Nöel, quizá te guste. Aunque no es garantizado.

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[Kelly]

http://www.divabooknerd.com/2013/10/waterfell-by-amalie-howard-arc.html
Waterfell wasn't a tale of an underwater city, of pretty beings living amongst us, it's the struggle Rissa faces with accepting who she is and what is expected of her. Rissa is a sea monster known as an Aquarathi, born to another planet, but now her people have settled within the deepest parts of our oceans. It was a brilliant concept and the characters were not only engaging, but likable. The storyline was a mixture of what felt like a contemporary young adult, when Nissa struggles with her feelings of being an average teen girl on the verge of becoming a woman, her first crush, a loyal best friend, her overprotective foster brother and where her loyalties lie. I loved the relationship between Riss and best friend Jenna, that true friendship knows no bounds, even when one is another species altogether.

The storyline does touch on sexual content, but keeping it within the confines appropriate for teen readers. It's well written and the plot twists will keep you on your toes. I'm now eagerly awaiting what Amalie has in store for the second in the series. I'm imagining a beautiful underwater world, magically and mystical. Just beautiful.

[Ashley]

Nose Graze — Young Adult book reviews

Waterfell barely qualifies as a mermaid book. The problem is that Nerissa has spent most of her recent life on land, so about 95% of the book takes place on land, in high school, with high school drama, and high school love interests. There are a couple snippets of mermaid action near the end, or talks about this underwater kingdom, but they don't feel real. Even the antagonist (Ehmora—the one who stole Nerissa's kingdom) feels distant and far away, because we don't physically meet her until the very end. So until then, it's just a vague idea of some evil mermaid.

One of my biggest problems with Waterfell was Nerissa herself. For the first half of the book in particular, Nerissa was a raging bitch. I hated her. Mostly she was a complete bitch to Lo, but what really drove me nuts was that she had no reason to insult him so much. Lo was nice to her and she was just like, "OMG he's so arrogant" (when he totally wasn't) and was an ass to him.

I could never fall for a boy like Lo. He's too self-confident and too amused all the time, like everything is part of some big joke.

"He's so self-absorbed, it's insane. He practically followed me here after the game."

It irks me that he looks entirely too comfortable.

Lo is still completely arrogant.

...over and over again... Just look at what she's saying. She was constantly looking for things about Lo to complain about. I mean, she's annoyed that he looks too comfortable? Seriously? But the big thing was that Nerissa constantly called him arrogant and self-absorbed but he wasn't. Lo was genuinely a nice guy.

Then, right after insulting him, she'd start drooling over him.

the fiery feeling still licking through my entire body at Lo's nearness.

My attraction to this boy is skyrocketing with each passing second and the attempt to calm my nervous energy is only making me focus on it more.

And who knows what that might have turned into—me climbing on top of Lo and having my way with him or...

His simple touch ignites a flame in the pit of my stomach that spreads through my chest and into my limbs like wildfire.

I'm drawn to [his eyes] like water.

And all this was insta-love at its finest. Lo and Nerissa never really sit down and talk, they don't get to know each other, and they don't slowly get intimate. There's a clear attraction immediately, Nerissa denies her feelings by insulting Lo, and then finally she gives in and they get all lusty. There's barely a real relationship here. Although I kind of liked Lo at times, I also felt like his character was quite shallow—probably because we don't actually learn much about him other than how his eyes are amazing and totally swim-able.

And when she wasn't insulting him or drooling over him, she was complaining about how he didn't like her, when he so obviously did.

he's not interested.

One thing I found hilarious was this line from Nerissa:

I'm not the one with the bipolar mood swings.

And yet... see above. She was totally bipolar. One minute she hates Lo because he's arrogant. The next she's like, "Omg I love you and want to swim in your eyes."

And from Lo's perspective.. why did he like Nerissa? She was kind of a bitch, so why did he like her? Well we have this lovely reasoning:

"Because you intrigue me. There's something so different about you. You're not at all like any of the girls I know."

Sigh. How many times have we heard that line in YA books? It's just that standard insta-love reason: There's something different about you.

In terms of writing, I found some of the lines at the end of the chapters to be so cheesy. I wish I highlighted more, but in the last half of the book I started highlighting a few of the last sentences in each chapter. It's like the end of each chapter was very specifically written to be something intense and dramatic, but I thought they were a bit over-done. It made them feel... lame.

She won't betray us. She can't. Or she'll have to die.

It's not Ehmora that will be the death of me. It's this boy.

Because one thing's for certain... if I don't, I'll die.

And the last thing I'll complain about is the twist at the end. It wasn't necessarily a bad twist, but I thought it was so obvious. I called it almost at the very beginning. I guessed that Lo was the Ehmora's son and that he was actually a mermaid-thing as well. I felt like it was a pretty obvious and typical twist. It's exactly what you'd expect.

There were a few things that I kind of liked about Waterfell. For example, I liked Nerissa's human friend Jenna. She was a little bit unrealistically smart, but she was kind of cool. I liked how intelligent she was and I even liked her boyfriend Sawyer. He kind of seemed like a big teddy bear (really sweet and nice, but not 100% all there lol).

Ultimately, Waterfell just weighed on my patience as the book went on. It started out okay, I tried to forgive the insta-love at first, but then Nerissa in particular just wore me down with her totally bitchy and bipolar attitude. And by the end of the book, I even lost interest in the overall plot and the whole idea of the mermaid kingdom. I was skimming the last like 20% of the book because I just wanted it to end.