Mermaids and Lazy Activists

Lavin’s genre-bending debut merges autofiction, fantasy, and ecological science into an inspiring if sluggish call to action. Narrator Maud, whose biographical details all align with Lavin’s, meets a mermaid named Evelyn in Lake Michigan. The women bond over fashion, poetry, and their shared concern about pollution in the Great Lakes (and elsewhere), and decide to do something about it. Their journey into eco-activism puts them in touch with local Indigenous communities that have been working on these issues for years and takes them down rabbit holes of internet research, onto a blueberry farm for a summer, and beyond. The plot is slight and slow moving, often pausing to make room for exposition about the ecological issues Maud and Evelyn confront. Perhaps most frustratingly for fantasy fans, Evelyn’s identity as a mermaid goes largely unexplored. Still, this serves as a thoughtful climate manifesto. (May)