The Summer of Chasing Mermaids

by Sarah Ockler

[bookishzelda]

The Summer of Chasing Mermaids, takes some mermaid lore and mixes it with contemporary. I loved the Cove and all it’s residents knitting together to make the story.

I loved Elyse. She is from Tobago, sister island of Trinidad, in the Caribbean and has come to the cove to escape the aftermath of an accident that caused the loss of her voice. She had dreamed of making it big as a singer with her twin sister Natalie. So losing her voice also meant losing a career for her. She is kind of going through the stages of grief and we don’t really even find out how it happened until the end. She has difficulty reliving it. The thing about Elyse is that she is a very strong woman inside and she doesn’t need a voice to be so. It just takes her some time in the book for her to really understand that.

The romance with Elyse and Christian was swoony and well paced. I liked all of their shared moments because we see them become more of friends first then things develop from there.

A very strong supporting cast. I love a book that takes characters that you would think you would hate but end up loving them. That’s kind of the case with Vanessa. I also loved Elyse cousin Kirby and Christian’s little brother Sebastian (he reminds me of my 5 yr old). There are also the others that breeze in and out like Lemon, Noah and some of the other girls. It made it really feel like a close community.

There are so many things brushed upon in the book. Women rights and the right to be who you are. Family dynamics and summers of no strings attached. Small businesses and keeping original character of a small town. It was great to see these things mixed in.

The mermaid lore was really interesting too because it’s a mix of a bunch of different tales. I loved that Elyse would go with Sebastian on his mermaid hunts.That little boy really knows his stuff.

I liked the plot and I really liked how Elyse finds her true voice and that some things are left appropriately open ended. This a good contemporary and definitely a perfect summer read.