By Water and Blood

Rose (Violet Shadows) weaves a modern fantasy tale that manages to be equal parts fascinating and dull. Young Sophie Durrant abandons her present-day American life to tend bar on Unst, one of the Shetland Islands north of Britain. She’s drawn to its gruff Scottish natives, its ponies, and most of all the sea—and the seals that live in it. Sophie eventually discovers that she is the granddaughter of a Selkie, a shape-shifter who can remove her sealskin to become human. She also learns about hunters who steal Selkie skins and force them into the world of human trafficking. Rose’s core conceit is strong and sophisticated; her descriptions of the pain of slavery resonate with the weight of history, and the descriptions of Unst are incredible. Far less compelling are the subplots, such as Sophie’s friend’s quest to get her to move back home, and her inevitable romance with a Selkie man who is (naturally) tall, dark-haired, and dashing. Rose’s updated Selkie myth is far too interesting to be paired with such conventional tropes, and the result is a very uneven novel. [em](BookLife) [/em]