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Aug. 18th, 2012 12:16 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
cblj_backupA cool perk of being involved in digital and indy publishing is that occasionally I get sent Advanced Reader Copies of novels that my friends and colleagues have put out. I feel like I have A Network. :D The only unfortunate side of this is that these ARCs are, of course, digital, and I do not own an e-reader. I'm working on it.
ANYWAY! This means it sometimes takes me some time to read them, because most of my reading is on the train. But I did finally get to read One Saved To The Sea, a novella by Catt Kingsgrave, which is a downright treat.
One Saved To The Sea is the story of Mairead, a lighthouse keeper in the Orkneys during WWII. Technically her father is the keeper, but he's become incapable of keeping the light since his sons, Mairead's three brothers, shipped out as Royal Navy sailors to the war.
Mairead is under threat from all sides -- her father is ill and requires care, and when her father dies she won't be allowed to fill the position of keeper and will have to leave her home. She's also being stalked by Durn Helzie, a local boy whom she caught stealing a selkie's skin during one of their dances on the beach-head near the lighthouse. And, being a woman, her complaints against Helzie aren't taken as seriously as his against her. The local priest wants her to join the convent because she's unmarried and not likely to be, and the well-meaning advances of the soldiers from the nearby base aren't really her style.
It's essentially a love story between Mairead and the selkie-woman whom she rescued from Helzie; it's a well-written romance and the sex is quite hot (if you've never read a sex scene involving intimate contact with a seal skin, after this, you will have!). But there's also a depth to it that adds a lot of layers: the plight of a woman whose "unnatural tastes" are murmured about in the local village, the vulnerability of being basically alone in an isolated place with someone stalking her, the rich mythology surrounding the idea of a selkie, and the legacies of parents and children, particularly the otherness that Mairead inherited from her mother.
Final Verdict: I found it a really enjoyable read, and I'm liking the fact that with so many people coming into literature (particularly erotic lit) from fandom, we're getting much less crude, much more interesting plots and porn than we used to.
As it's a small-press digital book, I thought I'd throw in the purchase links as well. It retails for $3.99 in ePub, Mobi, and PDF, and you can find it at Circlet Press, at Amazon, at Barnes & Noble, and at Smashwords.
ANYWAY! This means it sometimes takes me some time to read them, because most of my reading is on the train. But I did finally get to read One Saved To The Sea, a novella by Catt Kingsgrave, which is a downright treat.
One Saved To The Sea is the story of Mairead, a lighthouse keeper in the Orkneys during WWII. Technically her father is the keeper, but he's become incapable of keeping the light since his sons, Mairead's three brothers, shipped out as Royal Navy sailors to the war.
Mairead is under threat from all sides -- her father is ill and requires care, and when her father dies she won't be allowed to fill the position of keeper and will have to leave her home. She's also being stalked by Durn Helzie, a local boy whom she caught stealing a selkie's skin during one of their dances on the beach-head near the lighthouse. And, being a woman, her complaints against Helzie aren't taken as seriously as his against her. The local priest wants her to join the convent because she's unmarried and not likely to be, and the well-meaning advances of the soldiers from the nearby base aren't really her style.
It's essentially a love story between Mairead and the selkie-woman whom she rescued from Helzie; it's a well-written romance and the sex is quite hot (if you've never read a sex scene involving intimate contact with a seal skin, after this, you will have!). But there's also a depth to it that adds a lot of layers: the plight of a woman whose "unnatural tastes" are murmured about in the local village, the vulnerability of being basically alone in an isolated place with someone stalking her, the rich mythology surrounding the idea of a selkie, and the legacies of parents and children, particularly the otherness that Mairead inherited from her mother.
Final Verdict: I found it a really enjoyable read, and I'm liking the fact that with so many people coming into literature (particularly erotic lit) from fandom, we're getting much less crude, much more interesting plots and porn than we used to.
As it's a small-press digital book, I thought I'd throw in the purchase links as well. It retails for $3.99 in ePub, Mobi, and PDF, and you can find it at Circlet Press, at Amazon, at Barnes & Noble, and at Smashwords.
