The story progressed too fast for me. It wasn't bad just not the right fit for me personally. Maybe someone else might enjoy it more than me.

I really liked the premise of this novel, but I just couldn't get into it. I hated the villain like I was supposed to, but I didn't get enough depth with any of the characters. I wanted to connect with them but didn't. There were things I liked it about it. I loved Mren's story during her early meetings with Linnea, and I appreciated that the story came around full circle.

A really sweet but dramatic short novel. The duel storylines of leaving an abusive relationship and finding love again kept me interested the whole way through and I loved the ending.

I loved this story! The main character had an interesting story. And of course, a lesbian mermaid book never bores me! It was so interesting to see the two characters fall in love through dreams, touch and story-tellings. I did however see the ending coming (that's why it's 4 stars) but I enjoyed it nevertheless.

*received an ARC via netgalley*


This was an empowering short thriller featuring an f/f romance between a fat bisexual girl and a mermaid.

You shouldn't go into it expecting it to be a fluffy romance. That's only part of it, but there's massive trigger warnings for abuse, stalker ex boyfriend, violence, victim blaming (not condoned), gaslighting.

I had to put the book down for a bit because I hadn't exactly read the blurb or other reviews (my own fault) and I wasn't ready for all that. When I came back to the book I knew what I would face and I found it to be very well written and well developed for such a short story, plus there's something about a mermaid/human f/f story that always appeals to me.

I definitely recommend it (just make sure you're okay with the trigger warnings first) and it made me want to check out the author's other works.

Linnea's favourite spot is an area on a rocky shoreline where one misstep can catapult her straight into the sea. Despite its danger, this is where she meets and falls in love with, a mermaid called Mren. But Linnea's ex-boyfriend threatens the only thing Linnea loves, and she must do something before it goes too far.

Haws has something special here. This short story is incredible and manages to pack an exciting yet terrifying story into a mere 66 pages. 

The story moves between Linnea's time at sea and her life outside of her spot where she is constantly harassed by Mikey. Outside of the fantasy elements, the novella highlights the importance of taking abuse victims seriously. There are multiple moments where Linnea's reports of her boyfriend aren't taken seriously and there is a lack of care when it came to punishing harassers. 

I only have one complaint. This deserves to be a full-length novel. It has so much potential for a full-length novel, which would've allowed for longer and more detailed development between Linnea and Mren. (and space for Mren's history - her past history is a story in itself)

Overall, it's an interesting read about mermaids and revenge. Short, yet enjoyable.

Ugh, not sure how this happens to me so often, but I didn't realise when I requested this from NetGalley that it was a novella (and I checked, but there was no wordcount listed), so the length caught me off guard. I really don't do too well with short fiction -- I need more time to get into a book.

That said, I did feel this had fairly well developed characters considering its length, with Lin's backstory being explained but not just dumped in the narrative. I would have liked more worldbuilding -- we're asked to just accept that there's a mermaid, and we don't get any sense of whether there are lots of them, whether it's a whole community, what their culture is like... all the things that interest me about mermaids.

I wasn't a huge fan of the writing style, though. It felt a little clunky; names where pronouns would have worked fine and felt more natural was the main one that stood out. Also, for such a short book, it sure does spend quite a while at the beginning just describing the sea.

Mostly, this was enjoyable, but if I'd known it was a novella I wouldn't have requested it as they don't suit me too well. NetGalley really needs to implement a system to avoid this, because I keep falling into this trap.

(Real rating: 2.5*s)

* I received an ARC in exchange for an honest review by Netgalley*
Come to the Rocks was a great short story! The main character was very strong-willed, which I liked, specially when she faces her stalker ex.
The only thing I would change is the length. I would have loved to understand more of the mermaid!

Come to the Rocks has a sweet f/f romance story between a woman and a mermaid, against a thriller. The story is pretty short – 66 pages – so it just establishes a basic setting. Linnea lives somewhere along a coast and there is a particular part of the rocky beach she frequents, where she meets the mermaid, Mren. Meanwhile, she is also under constant threat from her ex-boyfriend, who is harassing her for breaking up with him, because he thinks he had the power in that relationship. Now, the beach and meeting Mren there daily, is the sole safe part of her day. Even her house is not safe from her ex, and despite having a restraining order against him, she isn’t getting much help from the authorities. As the plot furthers, Linnea’s fear is a central emotion, but so it the newer feelings of love and hope arising from her relationship with Mren – even so, she is mostly resigned to the fact that she will become a statistic on the evening news. The writing certainly drew me in, and Haws puts forth Linnea’s feelings in such detail, but still keeps the story going – remarkable given its length. I won’t say how it ends, but I will hint that it leans into the darker side of mermaid stories, giving the story a nice mixture of romance and thriller throughout.

Every so often, I come across a book that has been put into the wrong genre, and it's a struggle to reposition it in my mind and review it fairly. That was the case with this thriller/drama that was shelved as a romance.

What was advertised: A mermaid/bisexual human romance.

What I got: An abusive ex whose only aim was to ruin the life of the protagonist.

At the beginning of this book, Linnea's love of the water and its moods is well established. She hangs out at this particular part of the rocks, despite the fact that her ex knows he can sometimes find her there. As a result, she tries not to stay out after dark, when he might find her after he finishes work.

We find out shortly after the first meeting with Mikey that he is abusive, and Linnea's abrupt way of dealing with him isn't without reason. What follows is a slowly escalating abuse plot line where police aren't able to help quite enough, and Linnea comes to the point where her only hope is that her story after death becomes a cautionary tale that might change police protocol where stalking incidents are concerned.

It really goes into the psychology and the paranoia of a person who, by inches, has their own liberty removed. Though it was difficult to read at parts, I couldn't put it down.

In the midst of this, a mermaid shows up by Linnea's rocks, giving her the smallest spark of hope in this nightmare.

It was certainly a thrilling and page turning book. But not a romance. The friendship between Linnea and Mren was strong and does include a couple of kisses, but the story ended at Mikey's demise, which might have otherwise have been the start of Linnea and Mren's romance.

This is a cute little novella of about 66 pages, which had my interest piqued at "mermaid". But if only there was actually MORE mermaid! Instead, a majority of the short seems to be about the human protagonist's relationship with an abusive ex-boyfriend. I just didn't understand why the most interesting part of the story took a backseat to this other storyline, which is the least interesting part of the book. It feels like a completely missed opportunity at fully embracing the urban fantasy genre. Couple that with a pretty unsatisfying resolution and this has me grumbling to find a better take on a woman/mermaid love story.

<i>*I received this book from NineStar Press and Netgalley for an honest review*</i>

I recently read and reviewed a book, and my review was fixated on the abusive relationship on display in the book. That specific relationship type, abusive, wasn’t in the book description, and I could see how a reader could read the book and not see the same signs I saw. Instead of seeing and reading a love story, like the book called itself, I saw and read something else.


Similar thing happened here. Though here the short story description plainly admits to including an abusive relationship story line. And yet, like before, I became fixated on something <i>not</i> listed in the description or book genres. No, not the love story part, that was there in the description, no the potential unreliable narrator story line.

I’m not really sure how to react to this story, and/or how I am <i>supposed</i> to react to this story. There were some massive hints that I was reading a story that included both an abusive relationship (main POV character with the stalker ex-boyfriend) and a budding love story (main POV character with the mermaid). On the other hand there were hints, less massive, that I was reading an unreliable narrator story. Like the part wherein the narrator stated several times that their mental process was broken (not in those words), and they weren’t always 100% sure of what was going on around them. Like how Linnea found it more unbelievable that Mren, the mermaid, found Lin attractive, than the part where Mren was a mermaid; or the part wherein Mren tells Lin a story that is directly on point – a solution to Lin’s problems, before Mren learned what Lin’s problems actually were; or the part wherein Linnea was 100% convinced her stalker ex-boyfriend was inside her house – to the point she got up, went to her car, and drove to his house and was only reassured that he wasn’t inside because she saw his distinctive truck in his own driveway (though ‘reassured’ puts it strongly); or the part wherein Linnea had become numb to the idea that it was a question of when, not if, her ex-boyfriend Mikey would kill her and her story would appear on the news (which is one of the reasons she kept calling the police on ‘the stuff’ that was going on – so there would be a paper trail on him).

Bah, I’m going too long down that particular path. Point is: I’m not sure if I should read this as a story of Linnea, the main character and only point of view; her abusive stalker ex-boyfriend; or read this as a story about Linnea, her stalker ex-boyfriend, and her ingenious solution to the problem – and the mermaid was just a figment of her imagination (there are even hints, beyond the ‘found it more unbelievable that the mermaid was interested in her, than that she was spending time with a mermaid’ that the main character wasn’t even certain the mermaid was real).

Alas – there is no big reveal indicating one or the other plot-line is the ‘real’ one. And since I’m seeing the ‘unreliable narrator’ hints without a ‘big reveal’, and note of such in book description, I assume I should not read that specific plot-line into the story. Or something like that.

On the other hand – I’m not sure it matters. I’ve had to think long and hard on what I actually read, which genre I was actually in, and I’ve come to the conclusion that it doesn’t matter. At least in the sense that I’d end up at the same rating for either: love story with background stalker/ex-boyfriend; or unreliable narrator murder mystery. The same high rating.

It’s strange how I find myself where I find myself. To think I was going to do my normal ‘this is the first story I’ve read by this author’; ‘I became interested in reading this story because I had just recently started watching a television series called ‘Siren’ that involves a mermaid, though a different type of mermaid than appears in this story here’. But, alas, my review went off on a weird ‘other’ direction.

<b>Stalker ex-boyfriend/abusive relationship</b>: This is the story of a woman named Linnea. She’s chubby (self-aware comment on herself), and bisexual. She entered into a ‘not serious’ relationship with a guy named Mikey. When he started acting ‘weird’, and/or like he wanted more out of the relationship, she dumped him. He, in turn, could not accept that and the two of them have now spent more time in this ex-boyfriend/abusive/stalker situation than they did in their actual relationship. She has a restraining order on him. He ignores it. Does stuff that causes her to call the police. Adds to the paper trail, but he hadn’t, by the start of this story, done anything that would allow the police to actually do anything. The stalker/abusive asshole situation builds exponentially in this story.

<b>Love Story</b>: There’s one specific spot Linnea finds peace, comfort, safety. Everywhere else she finds herself in fear. Afraid that Mikey will show up there. ‘Her place’ is a specific spot on the coastline. A very rocky place next to a, normally, angry ocean. Very slippery and wet rocky place, with an ocean that would be super pleased to reach out, grab whoever is stupid enough to be on the rocks, and bash the person to death against the rocks. But Linnea can read the ocean. And knows when it is safe enough to be there.

During one of her times resting in her spot, she spots a glimmer on the water too quick to know if she actually saw something or not. Then it’s there longer – she’s spotted something. Then . . . there’s the face of a beautiful woman looking up at her, who Linnea later learns is Mren.

And that is the love story on display – the story of the budding romance between Linnea – human, and Mren – mermaid.

<b>Unreliable Narrator</b>: There are hints that I might have spotted incorrectly. If spotted correctly, this is something of a psychological horror – with a woman breaking (and she admits to herself that she is breaking – in the story line) to the point where she begins to have delusions/illusions, and ends up committing ‘the perfect murder’.

That, at least, is what I thought while reading the story. I’d not have even admitted seeing that in my review, though, if I hadn’t read the section after the story, about the author. I repeat, before I mention what I saw, that I thought of this unreliable narrator/psychological horror before reading that ‘about the author’ section. I did not get the idea from the fact that the author notes that they normally write horror stories, with occasional jumps into other stuff. *shrugs* It’s possible that what I saw was what I was supposed to see. It’s possible what I saw snuck in via an author who normally writes horror. It’s also possible that I, myself, am just insane and nothing I spotted was there.

(hehe – as I write this I keep remembering things that reinforce the ‘unreliable narrator’ thingie. My review could probably end up longer than the short story itself if I continued to note down these sudden remembrances – so I won’t – though I know I’m going to forget them as time passes (like the narrator noting how ‘magically modest’ the mermaid was – in that her hair, or the ocean itself, always covered her breasts – except for one very specific moment).

Rating: 4.77

April 6 2018