Word to the wise: If you get a chance to hock your book somewhere, you take it. It doesn’t matter if it’s a book blast blog or some lunatic lying stoned out of his gourd in the gutter. If you get a chance to push your book, do it and don’t look back.
Why do I bring this up? Well, Gevera Bert Piedmont has a wonderful book about mermaids and sharks that I accidentally stumbled across on one of my many sojourns across the seedy side of the Internet. It may have been in a group on Facebook or it may have been one of the writers’ threads on Fark. At any rate, I saw it and something about caught my eye. Probably the fact that it had a mermaid on the cover and I’ve never read a book about mermaids. So, what the heck, right?
Well, what I found wasn’t entirely what I expected, but it was much cooler. So, yeah, mermaids. But there’s also snappy dialogue, a fun plot, and a wildly exciting ride with podcasters, a high-tech arm, crab cakes, and a self-proclaimed mad scientist. All set in a town that Lovecraft would have written if he had any sense of humor or ability to write fun, quirky characters instead of loquacious, brooding husks of people broken down by the unseen horrors of deep, dark madness.
Now, I won’t give away the plot because this a tight cross between horror and mystery and the rules are you never give away the plots to those genres. Suffice it to say: Mermaids. But not like you expect. Add an exceptionally clever way of turning the initial antagonists into likeable – or at least relatable – characters while turning the possible victims into ample antagonists, toss in some outsiders who use their heads to find a third way, and you get a story that starts off horror-ish, turns into a great mystery, and ends on a note that makes you pang for more of Mickey’s down-to-Earth relatability and Pris’s wild-on-the-stick energy even if we never do get see the energy-sucking fey.
All in all, Shiver is just a damned fun book to read. It carries its somewhat lofty notes easily and doesn’t get overburdened by itself. And, at the end of the day, a fun book is a far better read than a lofty tome that leaves you wondering if you should slit your wrists or someone else’s.
Get it and enjoy it. It’ll leave a smile on your face.
“A 25-year-old one-armed woman, Mickey Crow, and her best friend, reluctant socialite Pris, are hired by a friend to investigate a mysterious midnight disappearance of a lifeguard trainee for their paranormal podcast, the Contrary Crowcast.
Shell Beach turns out to be an odd place full of strange people. Why does the diner’s waitress have a swimming pool full of sharks? Why is there no internet? Did that old fisherman with one leg really inspire the author of Jaws? Who is in the water constantly calling for help?
The answer will make you SHIVER.“