Atlantia by Ally Condie

Atlantia (Atlantia)

by Ally Condie

“Utterly captivating. A heroine unlike any I’d met before, a setting I’d never glimpsed, a story I’d never imagined. Atlantia is fresh, wild, and engrossing. I love Ally Condie.” —Shannon Hale, award-winning, bestselling author of Austenland and Dangerous

A New York Times Best Seller! 

Can you hear Atlantia breathing?

For as long as she can remember, Rio has dreamed of the sand and sky Above—of life beyond her underwater city of Atlantia. But in a single moment, all Rio’s hopes for the future are shattered when her twin sister, Bay, makes an unexpected choice, stranding Rio Below. Alone, ripped away from the last person who knew Rio’s true self—and the powerful siren voice she has long silenced—she has nothing left to lose.

Guided by a dangerous and unlikely mentor, Rio formulates a plan that leads to increasingly treacherous questions about her mother’s death, her own destiny, and the corrupted system constructed to govern the Divide between land and sea. Her life and her city depend on Rio to listen to the voices of the past and to speak long-hidden truths.

Reviewed by e_rodz_leb on

4 of 5 stars

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I’ve had a pretty bad experience with books about mermaids, so I’m happy to say that this isn’t one. So what exactly is Atlantia about? I shall tell you…

Atlantia is about courage, about doing what’s right, even when it’s not easy to do so. It is also about love, and sacrifice. It is also about prejudice, and discrimination.

Atlantia is narrated in the first person by Rio (Spanish for river.) Her twin sister, Bay and she are orphaned and trying to find their place in their underwater world. They live in Atlantia, a city built many centuries ago in the Below in order to make sure humanity survived the abused Earth in the Above. When Bay decided to leave Atlantia, without telling anyone, she’s devastated and she tries to find a way to join her. Rio is a siren and it’s feared in both worlds. Her mother, the former Minister, kept her gift hidden in order to protect her. She’s brave, realistic, pragmatic and very lonely. In her search for a way out of the city, she meets True.

True is so kind and happy. Even though he’s had a difficult life, he always makes an effort to keep busy, contribute any way he can and find happiness in that. I enjoyed that he could see pass Rio’s façade and that he learned to love her. Their relationship grew slowly and I wish that they were together more often and that their time together included more.

Bay is sweet, caring, gentle and more giving than Rio. Maire, is a powerful siren and their aunt, even though they don’t know her well, and she has an agenda of her own, she loves her nieces in their own way. As you can imagine, there are also bad people in the mix and you don’t always know good from bad.

The world building is really well done. I love that it never felt like an information dump, but that we knew enough to understand the story and learned more as Rio learned more. Religion (polytheism) is a big part of the life of both Above and Below. It gives both citizens faith in the system and makes their lives more structured. However, the book didn’t feel “preachy” or uncomfortable at all. The plot is politically driven, but we slowly discover each clue. This is my first book by Condie (I have Matched, but never started the series) and I liked her writing style.

Overall, Atlantia is a great read. I felt like the ending was sufficient for a standalone, but I still wanted more, especially more chemistry between True and Rio.

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Reading updates

  • Started reading
  • 3 October, 2014: Finished reading
  • 3 October, 2014: Reviewed