Fathomless (Fairy Tale Retelling) - Hardcover

Pearce, Jackson

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0316207780 ISBN 13: 9780316207782

Publisher: Little, Brown Books for Young Readers, 2012

Synopsis

Celia Reynolds is the youngest in a set of triplets and the one with the least valuable power. Anne can see the future, and Jane can see the present, but all Celia can see is the past. And the past seems so insignificant -- until Celia meets Lo.
Lo doesn't know who she is. Or who she was. Once a human, she is now almost entirely a creature of the sea -- a nymph, an ocean girl, a mermaid -- all terms too pretty for the soulless monster she knows she's becoming. Lo clings to shreds of her former self, fighting to remember her past, even as she's tempted to embrace her dark immortality.

When a handsome boy named Jude falls off a pier and into the ocean, Celia and Lo work together to rescue him from the waves. The two form a friendship, but soon they find themselves competing for Jude's affection. Lo wants more than that, though. According to the ocean girls, there's only one way for Lo to earn back her humanity. She must persuade a mortal to love her . . . and steal his soul.

About this title

About the Author

Jackson Pearce is the author of Sisters Red, Sweetly, Purity, and As You Wish. She lives in Atlanta, Georgia.

From School Library Journal

Gr 9 Up-Anne, Jane, and Celia are no ordinary triplets. Anne can read a person's future; Jane, their present; and Celia, their past. The girls spend their days wandering the boardwalk of their coastal town and testing their powers on the tourists. Although Celia's sisters insist that they are "stronger together," she has always felt like the weakest link. However, when she meets Lo, a mysterious girl who lives in the ocean and has no recollection of her human life, she finally understands the value of her unique gift. They work together to unravel Lo's past; but the more Lo remembers, the more she'd like to forget. Chapters alternate between Lo's and Celia's perspectives as Lo struggles to understand who she is and Celia strives to form an identity separate from her sisters. This modern-day retelling of Hans Christian Andersen's "The Little Mermaid" plays up the dark side of the fairy tale; teens will find themselves both entranced and terrified by Pearce's world beneath the waves and the tension between the two protagonists once they begin fighting for the love of the same boy. Those who have read the author's other books will delight in the tie-ins, but familiarity with them is not necessary to follow the story. Fans of Frank Beddor's The Looking Glass Wars (Dial, 2006) and Marissa Meyer's Cinder (Feiwel & Friends, 2012) are likely to enjoy this quick-paced revamp.-Jennifer Furuyama, Pendleton Public Library, ORα(c) Copyright 2011. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.

Edition details

• Publisher: Little, Brown Books for Young Readers
• Publication date: 2012
• ISBN 10: 0316207780
• ISBN 13: 9780316207782
• Binding: Hardcover
• Language: English
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 304