This book possibly makes a new genre. It's a fictional field guide, but not based on lore or fairytales. I think it would be better represented if the title were "A Field Guide to Mermaids" or something similar, how bird and bug guides are titled. The current title made me think it would be a picture book, along the lines of the How to Catch series.

I liked the illustrations of the mermaids.

I do wonder what the target audience is - older elementary? Tweens?

Thank you NetGalley for the ARC.

I enjoy books with some suspension of reality, but this one left me feeling a little jaded. Instead of succeeding in making mermaids feel very real, it only made everything else in the book feel less real (like the part about under water animals).

I also didn't get any of the cool - 'this is where this legend came from' history that made me excited to read this, since it was impossible to differentiate between what came from old myths and what was pure author invention.

Now that I reread the description on goodreads, I see that it's pretty obviously what it is, so that's on me for not taking more care and time in selecting what to read.

Other than my personal hang ups, this is a well written book with cute, fun, and vibrant illustrations.