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The Little Mermaid: Against the Tide
An original novel written by New York Times best-selling author J. Elle inspired by Disney upcoming live action reimagining of The Little Mermaid.
After the death of Ariel’s mother, the queen of the sea, the seven daughters of King Triton have grown estranged at best. It’s been years since Ariel’s older sisters have visited home. But this year’s Coral Moon is fast approaching, and it’s a special one for Ariel. Finally fifteen, she will be dubbed the Protector of her very own ocean territory as is tradition, and her sisters have agreed to visit for the celebration.
But the ceremony is halted when Mala, one of the most renowned daughters of Triton, is abducted. The only clue to where she might have been taken is a hastily scribbled seaweed note, which says, “What could have saved Mother could save me, too.” To rescue Mala, Ariel must work together with her siblings, traveling to various seas, outsmarting dangerous ocean creatures, and delving into forbidden waters to find the truth of what happened to their mother. But as Ariel and her sisters begin uncovering new secrets about their family and their kingdom, Ariel will have to face the loss of a mother she never had a chance to know and discover what it means to be both a good sister and a strong leader.
And the clock is ticking, because on the day of the festival, when the moon turns a true shade of coral, her sister will be lost, like her mother, forever
320 pages, Hardcover
First published April 11, 2023
70 people are currently reading
1742 people want to read
About the author
J. Elle
20 books1,503 followersJ. ELLE is the New York Times bestselling author of young adult and middle-grade fantasy fiction and a 2022 NAACP Image Award Nominee for Outstanding Literary Work for Youth and Teens. Her work has been translated into three languages. The former educator credits her nomadic lifestyle and humble inner-city beginnings as inspiration for her novels. When she’s not writing, Elle can be found on the hunt for new desserts sans Chocolat, looking for literally any excuse to get dressed up, and road-tripping her way across the country with her two dogs in tow.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 179 reviews
April 30, 2023
As a lifelong fan of Disney's adaptation of "The Little Mermaid," I was curious when I learned that the upcoming live-action remake would have a prequel novel. For a fan like me, it seemed like required reading prior to the upcoming movie on May 26th. Would the book be a love letter to fans that expands upon the musical and colorful world that was depicted in the animated series, or would it rewrite history and change everything that Disney has established about their underwater fantasy world? As it turns out, Against the Tide by J. Elle is very much the latter. Though the author touts herself as a childhood fan of Disney's The Little Mermaid in the Acknowledgements section at the back of the book, the story proceeds to tear apart everything that Disney has built over the last 30 years about the characters, world, and backstory in favor of a more original and darker take.
One year before the events of The Little Mermaid, Ariel was a 15-year-old rebel who went on magical adventures throughout Atlantica where she sang songs and supported other beings in the sea who were outcasts like herself. OR one year before the events of The Little Mermaid, Ariel was a 15-year-old dreamer who dared to restore music to a broken land that her father tainted through his mourning. OR one year before the events of The Little Mermaid, Ariel was a studious 15-year-old leader preparing to take on the role of Protector to her own kingdom while bringing together her estranged sisters from six different parts of the ocean. According to Disney, all three of these different takes on Ariel's past are correct. Each version also contains a completely different way that she met her best friend, Flounder. With each retelling of Ariel's history, the world around her gets darker, and her personality becomes less bubbly and carefree. The incarnation presented in Against the Tide, where she behaves as though she is 30 despite being written as 15, is the most serious one yet.
The Ariel in this book is too busy learning how to rule her own kingdom to go on silly adventures collecting human knickknacks and take in unusual pets. In this world, every princess is granted her own kingdom in a different part of the ocean on her 15th birthday, complete with her own castle and royal court. It seems oddly convenient to have seven uninhabited kingdoms for every daughter of Triton with no other rulers. Instead of the colorful and heavily populated kingdom of Atlantica that Disney created in their animated adaptations, this world is cold, barren, and empty. Not only are all of Ariel's sisters separated by their individual kingdoms, which each encompass an entire sea, but there are no other merfolk that she interacts with outside of her own family. All of the servants in their various castles are either fish or crustaceans, and the one illicit romance in the book is between a mermaid and a sea monster. Instead of focusing on racism toward the humans to foreshadow the upcoming movie, the book instead introduces the rocky relations between merfolk and sea monsters as Ariel tries ease the tensions between their two races.
Ariel's sisters, who have been rewritten, redesigned, and renamed from the original canon, are all major players in this book. Ariel has a much closer relationship with them than she did in the animated Disney adaptations, where they functioned as a single unit while Ariel liked to sneak off on her own. Here, none of the sisters like each other, and Ariel is the glue that must hold them together. The sister Ariel is closest with is Perla, who resembles Arista from the animated world through both her personality and her red color scheme. Each sister has an H2O: Just Add Water-like superpower that they activate by singing, but these abilities are not a major part of the story. The plot begins when one of the sisters, Mala, is kidnapped on the eve of Ariel's ceremony to become a Protector of Carinae. The ceremony gets canceled, and Ariel begins a search to find her. Her quest takes her to all seven kingdoms as she recruits each of her sisters and convinces them to get along to help her find Mala. Along the way, she meets Flounder, who becomes her partner in crime in tracking down all sea monster Residents in her sisters' kingdoms and comparing notes to solve the mystery of Mala's disappearance. Recovering a kidnapped mermaid after receiving a ransom note is hardly a plot that would have been used in the animated series and seems to be an indicator of the darker tone that Disney is going for with their reimagined world.
Against the Tide presents a creative original mermaid world, but it does not feel like a Disney one. I felt like I had to put "Ariel" in quotes every time I saw her name because she acts so differently from the bubbly carefree mermaid I grew up with. The world in this book is so vast and yet so empty without any other mer-companions besides Ariel's sisters. There are no equivalents to characters like Urchin, Pearl, or Gabriella from the series. Giving each sister her own kingdom at the age of 15 to leave home and, in some cases like that of Tamika, never talk to her family again destroys the tight-knit dynamic of the original canon that made Triton so overprotective of Ariel in the first place. If all of his daughters swam away to different corners of the ocean as teenagers and were rarely seen again, he would not mind as much if Ariel wanted to go to the surface. Oddly enough, Ariel showed very little interest in the surface world. Humans were referred to as "MerHunters," and Ariel was just as afraid of them as everyone else. The book works okay on its own, but since it is clearly being targeted to fans of Disney's The Little Mermaid by featuring their version of the character, it seems rather tone deaf by reversing everything that has been established about the character for over three decades.
One year before the events of The Little Mermaid, Ariel was a 15-year-old rebel who went on magical adventures throughout Atlantica where she sang songs and supported other beings in the sea who were outcasts like herself. OR one year before the events of The Little Mermaid, Ariel was a 15-year-old dreamer who dared to restore music to a broken land that her father tainted through his mourning. OR one year before the events of The Little Mermaid, Ariel was a studious 15-year-old leader preparing to take on the role of Protector to her own kingdom while bringing together her estranged sisters from six different parts of the ocean. According to Disney, all three of these different takes on Ariel's past are correct. Each version also contains a completely different way that she met her best friend, Flounder. With each retelling of Ariel's history, the world around her gets darker, and her personality becomes less bubbly and carefree. The incarnation presented in Against the Tide, where she behaves as though she is 30 despite being written as 15, is the most serious one yet.
The Ariel in this book is too busy learning how to rule her own kingdom to go on silly adventures collecting human knickknacks and take in unusual pets. In this world, every princess is granted her own kingdom in a different part of the ocean on her 15th birthday, complete with her own castle and royal court. It seems oddly convenient to have seven uninhabited kingdoms for every daughter of Triton with no other rulers. Instead of the colorful and heavily populated kingdom of Atlantica that Disney created in their animated adaptations, this world is cold, barren, and empty. Not only are all of Ariel's sisters separated by their individual kingdoms, which each encompass an entire sea, but there are no other merfolk that she interacts with outside of her own family. All of the servants in their various castles are either fish or crustaceans, and the one illicit romance in the book is between a mermaid and a sea monster. Instead of focusing on racism toward the humans to foreshadow the upcoming movie, the book instead introduces the rocky relations between merfolk and sea monsters as Ariel tries ease the tensions between their two races.
Ariel's sisters, who have been rewritten, redesigned, and renamed from the original canon, are all major players in this book. Ariel has a much closer relationship with them than she did in the animated Disney adaptations, where they functioned as a single unit while Ariel liked to sneak off on her own. Here, none of the sisters like each other, and Ariel is the glue that must hold them together. The sister Ariel is closest with is Perla, who resembles Arista from the animated world through both her personality and her red color scheme. Each sister has an H2O: Just Add Water-like superpower that they activate by singing, but these abilities are not a major part of the story. The plot begins when one of the sisters, Mala, is kidnapped on the eve of Ariel's ceremony to become a Protector of Carinae. The ceremony gets canceled, and Ariel begins a search to find her. Her quest takes her to all seven kingdoms as she recruits each of her sisters and convinces them to get along to help her find Mala. Along the way, she meets Flounder, who becomes her partner in crime in tracking down all sea monster Residents in her sisters' kingdoms and comparing notes to solve the mystery of Mala's disappearance. Recovering a kidnapped mermaid after receiving a ransom note is hardly a plot that would have been used in the animated series and seems to be an indicator of the darker tone that Disney is going for with their reimagined world.
Against the Tide presents a creative original mermaid world, but it does not feel like a Disney one. I felt like I had to put "Ariel" in quotes every time I saw her name because she acts so differently from the bubbly carefree mermaid I grew up with. The world in this book is so vast and yet so empty without any other mer-companions besides Ariel's sisters. There are no equivalents to characters like Urchin, Pearl, or Gabriella from the series. Giving each sister her own kingdom at the age of 15 to leave home and, in some cases like that of Tamika, never talk to her family again destroys the tight-knit dynamic of the original canon that made Triton so overprotective of Ariel in the first place. If all of his daughters swam away to different corners of the ocean as teenagers and were rarely seen again, he would not mind as much if Ariel wanted to go to the surface. Oddly enough, Ariel showed very little interest in the surface world. Humans were referred to as "MerHunters," and Ariel was just as afraid of them as everyone else. The book works okay on its own, but since it is clearly being targeted to fans of Disney's The Little Mermaid by featuring their version of the character, it seems rather tone deaf by reversing everything that has been established about the character for over three decades.
April 11, 2023
Quick, easy read as an adult that I know fans eager for the upcoming live action Little Mermaid movie will enjoy! This is essentially the prequel to the movie, ending with a certain familiar someone plotting. Definitely a older elementary-early middle grade level reading. Cute story with a good message. Readers coming in familiar with the Disney 1989 classic will have to adjust to some new dynamics but ultimately I think find enjoyment in the reimagined characters. I was graciously given an early , unedited, reader copy and all views expressed are my own.
May 17, 2023
I absolutely adored this book. It’s a celebration of black girls, their skin, their hair, their strength. This version of Ariel is absolutely gorgeous and I was so happy to see Halle Bailey on the cover, clearly connecting this to the new movie!
I also really appreciated that this story isn’t about Ariel and Eric. The Little Mermaid is seen as a romance by many, but this book takes care to assert Ariel as a strong, clever, and kind ruler, without her connection to a love interest. Her relationships with her sisters, her father, and Flounder are the defining relationships of this book and it really emphasizes how platonic and familial love is just as fulfilling as romantic love.
Seeing Ariel and her sisters reconnect and come together in order to save Mala, who is kidnapped early in the book, was really beautiful! In the original film, Ariel’s sisters don’t really have any importance in the story. But I appreciate how this version of The Little Mermaid interprets them as being just as fully realized and developed as Ariel, and as very important figures in her life!
I also loved getting to see how Ariel and Flounder met! Flounder is just as cute in this book as he is in the movie, and so is their friendship!
My only complaints are that the story wrapped up rather quickly at the end, and I would have liked to see more of Ariel’s traits in this book. She wasn’t as curious and as daring as I think most people know the character to be!
But overall, I really loved Against the Tide! I highly recommend it to any Little Mermaid fans, and I especially urge any readers to pick it up before the movie releases. I can’t wait to see the movie after having this lovely little story fresh in my mind!
The Little Mermaid: Against the Tide - 4.5 stars
I also really appreciated that this story isn’t about Ariel and Eric. The Little Mermaid is seen as a romance by many, but this book takes care to assert Ariel as a strong, clever, and kind ruler, without her connection to a love interest. Her relationships with her sisters, her father, and Flounder are the defining relationships of this book and it really emphasizes how platonic and familial love is just as fulfilling as romantic love.
Seeing Ariel and her sisters reconnect and come together in order to save Mala, who is kidnapped early in the book, was really beautiful! In the original film, Ariel’s sisters don’t really have any importance in the story. But I appreciate how this version of The Little Mermaid interprets them as being just as fully realized and developed as Ariel, and as very important figures in her life!
I also loved getting to see how Ariel and Flounder met! Flounder is just as cute in this book as he is in the movie, and so is their friendship!
My only complaints are that the story wrapped up rather quickly at the end, and I would have liked to see more of Ariel’s traits in this book. She wasn’t as curious and as daring as I think most people know the character to be!
But overall, I really loved Against the Tide! I highly recommend it to any Little Mermaid fans, and I especially urge any readers to pick it up before the movie releases. I can’t wait to see the movie after having this lovely little story fresh in my mind!
The Little Mermaid: Against the Tide - 4.5 stars
February 14, 2024
2024 reads: 34/250
2024 tbr: 20/120
set in the world of the little mermaid, this book follows ariel as she’s preparing to be dubbed protector of her very own ocean. the ceremony is put on hold, though, when one of her sisters is kidnapped. she works with her other sisters to bring mala home and find her abductor before the coral moon.
i really enjoyed this book because it showed a new side of ariel that isn’t explored in the old cartoon or the new live action movie: her being happy in the ocean and with her sisters. ariel still had her adventurous side, but this was set in the sea, and i loved this exploration of her character and her relationships with other characters. i also think this book was well-written, as it’s digestible for younger readers, and enjoyable for older ones. i hope this becomes a series!
2024 tbr: 20/120
set in the world of the little mermaid, this book follows ariel as she’s preparing to be dubbed protector of her very own ocean. the ceremony is put on hold, though, when one of her sisters is kidnapped. she works with her other sisters to bring mala home and find her abductor before the coral moon.
i really enjoyed this book because it showed a new side of ariel that isn’t explored in the old cartoon or the new live action movie: her being happy in the ocean and with her sisters. ariel still had her adventurous side, but this was set in the sea, and i loved this exploration of her character and her relationships with other characters. i also think this book was well-written, as it’s digestible for younger readers, and enjoyable for older ones. i hope this becomes a series!
September 1, 2024
2.5 ⭐️
Just because I like the Little Mermaid
Just because I like the Little Mermaid
February 10, 2025
This was some fun Little Mermaid lore I didn’t know I needed. You learn quite a bit in this book about Ariel’s mother and sisters (which was nice) and you get a glimpse into some of the more magical, powerful elements of the world of the merpeople (which was fun to dabble in). I wouldn’t say this book packages all that in the most exciting way, per se, but it was fun.
April 23, 2023
This was so good! Loved every bit of it! The story is darker than I thought it was going to be which was a nice surprise, the characters were well written and the review saying Ariel was out of character clearly must have read something else or never watched the original show/movie because every bit was in character for Ariel as a whole. An alternative origin does not mean the character themself is destroyed, especially when the origin itself is clearly heavily inspired by what happened in the Ariels' beginning movie - literally down to the memorial for Ariels' mum. This book was a good read, and I finished it fast as I didn't want to stop! Can't wait for the movie!
June 10, 2023
Against the Tide is a nice prequel to The Little Mermaid movie. It takes you into the depths of the ocean and through 7 different territories that Ariel’s sisters and soon Ariel, are protectors of in search of their kidnapped sister Mala. You get to find out how Ariel meets her friend, Flounder and learn more about Ariel’s family and each sister! I had always wanted to know more about the other sisters ever since I saw the original Little Mermaid as a kid.
While Against the Tide is a fun, oceanic read, there were just some things missing. Ariel isn’t at all interested in humans on land. She’s actually afraid of them since they are known as Merhunters. The main part of the movie adaptations of Ariel is her wonder of humans and life on land. That’s completely lacking in the novel. Also, the idea that King Triton would want his daughters to be so far from him in their different territories starting at age 15 doesn’t make sense. King Triton in the movies is so protective of his daughters that he borderlines controlling over them and keeps them close to him out of safety and concern. While the book’s King is demanding in obeying his orders, I can’t see the movie King allowing his 15 year old daughters to just leave home and rule a new land with sea creatures he doesn’t trust.
I did enjoy how the novel touches on important topics such as grief, family dynamics, and not holding prejudices because someone looks and lives differently. King Triton makes assumptions about all sea creatures (he calls them sea monsters) just because they are different than mermaids. Ariel from the start is vehemently against such prejudices and that is a huge takeaway for young readers.
While Against the Tide is a fun, oceanic read, there were just some things missing. Ariel isn’t at all interested in humans on land. She’s actually afraid of them since they are known as Merhunters. The main part of the movie adaptations of Ariel is her wonder of humans and life on land. That’s completely lacking in the novel. Also, the idea that King Triton would want his daughters to be so far from him in their different territories starting at age 15 doesn’t make sense. King Triton in the movies is so protective of his daughters that he borderlines controlling over them and keeps them close to him out of safety and concern. While the book’s King is demanding in obeying his orders, I can’t see the movie King allowing his 15 year old daughters to just leave home and rule a new land with sea creatures he doesn’t trust.
I did enjoy how the novel touches on important topics such as grief, family dynamics, and not holding prejudices because someone looks and lives differently. King Triton makes assumptions about all sea creatures (he calls them sea monsters) just because they are different than mermaids. Ariel from the start is vehemently against such prejudices and that is a huge takeaway for young readers.
March 13, 2024
I thoroughly enjoyed reading this book, when I was younger I was obsessed with anything to do with mermaid's so when I heard there was a book based off of the new movie I was very very excited and read it asap. Overall I loved the plot and I like how we go to see a bit more of her sisters different personalities. If you've seen the new movie you will know that we do see the sisters for a couple brief moments but its Ariel's movie so its mainly about her of course lol. So I'm glad the writer included more information about her sisters as well. And seeing Ariel in a different story besides the main story in the movies was a nice addition. All in all I give it 5/5 :)
June 21, 2023
Not what I was expecting & a lot darker in tone. This didn’t feel like the Ariel we’d been introduced to in the movie. I wasn’t disappointed per se but I didn’t overly enjoy it either. Nice to see more of the sisters then they were shown in the film
June 16, 2023
3.5 stars
I really enjoyed the world building in this story. I enjoyed the adventure across all of the seven seas and seeing Ariel recruit all her sisters to try and find Mala. The political aspect was an interesting touch. Another reviewer pointed out that there were no other merfolk aside from Ariel, Triton, and Ariel’s sisters and I found that kind of strange too.
But I did like the way this book scratched my itch for more scenes with Ariel and her sisters.
I really enjoyed the world building in this story. I enjoyed the adventure across all of the seven seas and seeing Ariel recruit all her sisters to try and find Mala. The political aspect was an interesting touch. Another reviewer pointed out that there were no other merfolk aside from Ariel, Triton, and Ariel’s sisters and I found that kind of strange too.
But I did like the way this book scratched my itch for more scenes with Ariel and her sisters.
July 4, 2023
This was a nice story, but I just didn't love it. I just didn't feel like it had the depth and development it needed, and the story line, while great, just didn't get delivered to it's best potential.
I don't know that I would recommend this, because I just never got pulled into the story, and that is a no-go for me. I am sad because I absolutely love Ariel, and had high hopes for this one!
I don't know that I would recommend this, because I just never got pulled into the story, and that is a no-go for me. I am sad because I absolutely love Ariel, and had high hopes for this one!
July 5, 2023
I really wanted to like this book but in all honesty, I just found it boring. It didn't keep my interest and anytime it did it would only last for a minute or so. I felt no reason to pick up the book when I wasn't reading it. It just felt like a chore.
June 17, 2023
from king triton's rage issues, fish racism, and mala marrying a sea creature, i do not blame ariel for wanting to become a human; i'd want to get away from that bonkers family too
if i ever turn into a mermaid and any of you pull up to my wedding only to see me and my new whale shark lover saying "i do" at the alter, please kill me then and there because i have lost my damn mind
and don't get me wrong, i totally get that mala marrying that..fish..was supposed to be a metaphor for interracial marriage. HOWEVER. you mean to tell me THERE WASN'T A BETTER WAY TO PORTRAY INTERRACIAL MARRIAGE THAN HAVING A MERMAID MARRY A FISH? it's fine. it's fine. everything is fine. i feel very normal about this. (this has been plaguing me for days. this has to be SOME flavor of unethical even in the ocean. is this not technically 50% bestiality?? what??) i'm totally against the fish racism too, but that does not mean i'm gonna go and marry one, TAKE NOTES MALA.
i have not seen a single review where anybody else was talking about mala marrying a sea creature and IM GETTING CONCERNED Y'ALL. AM I THE ONLY PERSON DISTURBED BY THIS?? AM I CRAZY??
the writing is meh but also idk what else to expect from a YA disney book. then again, the target audience is probably 12 year olds, so who am i to speak on this at my big age of 18.
i'm sorry i forgot just about everything else in this book besides the mermaid x fish rarepair that i didn't even know i was getting myself into. i'm trying to look at this book beyond that detail but it gave me such insane whiplash and i will never truly recover. i'm sorry this review is just me recounting The Horrors i have experienced.
AGAIN: there was really no other possible way to portray interracial marriage...than having it be between..a fish..and a mermaid..good god it's getting dark y'all
now, maybe i am crazy. maybe it is normal to marry a sea monster as a humanoid species. maybe that is actually super chill and ethical and i have been blinded by my own worldview. to be fair: the fish husband CAN talk and therefore CAN technically consent. so perhaps it is ethical on a technical basis. but also: why. WHY. if it's only ethical on a *technical* basis, i do not consider it to be all that ethical..
dear disney i hope you realize that this has essentially opened the door for king triton x sebastian fanfic. because now we can marry the sea creatures
I DON'T UNDERSTAND I DON'T UNDERSTAND maybe i'm just a fishphobic closed minded dummy like king triton idk. BUT WHY ARE WE MARRYING FISH NOW
i just needed to get this off my chest. i'd like to say i feel better now, but i would be lying. i have spent hours of my days staring helplessly off into the void as i am plagued by the mere concept of mermaid bestiality now being canon disney material
(anyways on a positive note my fav sisters were tamika and perla i found them both to be very slay. also the cover is beautiful!)
if i ever turn into a mermaid and any of you pull up to my wedding only to see me and my new whale shark lover saying "i do" at the alter, please kill me then and there because i have lost my damn mind
and don't get me wrong, i totally get that mala marrying that..fish..was supposed to be a metaphor for interracial marriage. HOWEVER. you mean to tell me THERE WASN'T A BETTER WAY TO PORTRAY INTERRACIAL MARRIAGE THAN HAVING A MERMAID MARRY A FISH? it's fine. it's fine. everything is fine. i feel very normal about this. (this has been plaguing me for days. this has to be SOME flavor of unethical even in the ocean. is this not technically 50% bestiality?? what??) i'm totally against the fish racism too, but that does not mean i'm gonna go and marry one, TAKE NOTES MALA.
i have not seen a single review where anybody else was talking about mala marrying a sea creature and IM GETTING CONCERNED Y'ALL. AM I THE ONLY PERSON DISTURBED BY THIS?? AM I CRAZY??
the writing is meh but also idk what else to expect from a YA disney book. then again, the target audience is probably 12 year olds, so who am i to speak on this at my big age of 18.
i'm sorry i forgot just about everything else in this book besides the mermaid x fish rarepair that i didn't even know i was getting myself into. i'm trying to look at this book beyond that detail but it gave me such insane whiplash and i will never truly recover. i'm sorry this review is just me recounting The Horrors i have experienced.
AGAIN: there was really no other possible way to portray interracial marriage...than having it be between..a fish..and a mermaid..good god it's getting dark y'all
now, maybe i am crazy. maybe it is normal to marry a sea monster as a humanoid species. maybe that is actually super chill and ethical and i have been blinded by my own worldview. to be fair: the fish husband CAN talk and therefore CAN technically consent. so perhaps it is ethical on a technical basis. but also: why. WHY. if it's only ethical on a *technical* basis, i do not consider it to be all that ethical..
dear disney i hope you realize that this has essentially opened the door for king triton x sebastian fanfic. because now we can marry the sea creatures
I DON'T UNDERSTAND I DON'T UNDERSTAND maybe i'm just a fishphobic closed minded dummy like king triton idk. BUT WHY ARE WE MARRYING FISH NOW
i just needed to get this off my chest. i'd like to say i feel better now, but i would be lying. i have spent hours of my days staring helplessly off into the void as i am plagued by the mere concept of mermaid bestiality now being canon disney material
(anyways on a positive note my fav sisters were tamika and perla i found them both to be very slay. also the cover is beautiful!)
August 20, 2023
I really enjoyed reading this book
May 27, 2023
The Little Mermaid: Against the Tide by J. Elle
7h 9m narrated by Marcella Cox, 320 pages
Genre: Fantasy > Young Adult Fantasy, Mermaids; Retellings, Young Adult Fiction, Family, Folklore
Featuring: Politics, Sea Monsters, Royalty, Investigation, Sisters, Father-Daughter Relationships, Prejudice
Rating as a movie: PG for danger and mild violence
My rating: ⭐️⭐️⭐️½
My thoughts: 📱30% 2:09:03 Ch. 7 - So, this story is set a year before the events of the movie. So far, it's just giving me the feeling I had about the series as a kid, torn between wanting to go with the flow and being unable to ignore the plotholes.
📱65% 4:39:34 Ch. 15 - I can already tell this is just gonna be OK. It is nice to familiarize myself with the sisters before I see the movie today. My only goal now is to finish it before my showing; I don't like it much.
📱76% 5:27:31 Ch. 18 - I didn't make it. This is so predictable that I had it mostly figured out early on. I'm stopping so I can see the movie. 🎬
Seeing the movie helped a lot with recognizing the sisters' characters as they appeared in the story. Like most prequels, this is meant to be read after the first story, but reading it first offers no spoilers to the movie. Apparently the book and movie didn't agree on Ursula's relation to Ariel's parents. This story was okay but it got a half-star for a good ending.
Recommend to others: Only if you're really into this franchise.
7h 9m narrated by Marcella Cox, 320 pages
Genre: Fantasy > Young Adult Fantasy, Mermaids; Retellings, Young Adult Fiction, Family, Folklore
Featuring: Politics, Sea Monsters, Royalty, Investigation, Sisters, Father-Daughter Relationships, Prejudice
Rating as a movie: PG for danger and mild violence
My rating: ⭐️⭐️⭐️½
My thoughts: 📱30% 2:09:03 Ch. 7 - So, this story is set a year before the events of the movie. So far, it's just giving me the feeling I had about the series as a kid, torn between wanting to go with the flow and being unable to ignore the plotholes.
📱65% 4:39:34 Ch. 15 - I can already tell this is just gonna be OK. It is nice to familiarize myself with the sisters before I see the movie today. My only goal now is to finish it before my showing; I don't like it much.
📱76% 5:27:31 Ch. 18 - I didn't make it. This is so predictable that I had it mostly figured out early on. I'm stopping so I can see the movie. 🎬
Seeing the movie helped a lot with recognizing the sisters' characters as they appeared in the story. Like most prequels, this is meant to be read after the first story, but reading it first offers no spoilers to the movie. Apparently the book and movie didn't agree on Ursula's relation to Ariel's parents. This story was okay but it got a half-star for a good ending.
Recommend to others: Only if you're really into this franchise.
May 31, 2023
Great for little fries and used to be little fries a like!!
Such a fun And easy read!! This is a commissioned prequel to Disney’s live action Little Mermaid! I’m so glad that J Elle took her time and honed in on the little things that make black girlhood so special and threaded them through it this book! It made me even more excited to go see the movie…today!!!! Yall she Got her scalp moisturized under the sea OKAYY! Ariel was ready to become the protector of her sea but there were some obstacles that only she overcome to save the day! An action packed and fast paced prequel! This Ariel story is unlike any adaption I’ve seen or read and my inner child smiled the entire time!!
Such a fun And easy read!! This is a commissioned prequel to Disney’s live action Little Mermaid! I’m so glad that J Elle took her time and honed in on the little things that make black girlhood so special and threaded them through it this book! It made me even more excited to go see the movie…today!!!! Yall she Got her scalp moisturized under the sea OKAYY! Ariel was ready to become the protector of her sea but there were some obstacles that only she overcome to save the day! An action packed and fast paced prequel! This Ariel story is unlike any adaption I’ve seen or read and my inner child smiled the entire time!!
June 25, 2023
I have so many thoughts about this one. It was a mixed bag for me because it was sort of like this weird ebb and flow where I was engaged at times and then I realized I zoned out and missed a ton and had to go back.
Firstly, I loved that we got back story on the sisters and how this version of the kingdom worked. The sisters were protectors of different oceans-- their voice was their power and they all had different powers when they came of age that their mother taught them.
Can we take a moment to realize that Disney dropped a ball. So, the guards in the kingdom are what they call "sea monsters" -- hot dudes with fins that are bad asses. I was like, "wait a minute! Why aren't they in the movie!" Because the book sets up that this was a big thing in the kingdom. Not only was there hot sea monsters but Ariel writes a law to give
them equal rights.
Ariel's father is a subject of issue for me. Not only a narcissist, but a misogynist also. Ariel, along with her sister Pearla, saved the kingdom and their sister Mala. The other thing is there is merhunters, and they aren't human. They are other fishfolk who sell their scales.
While I'm excited this gave us back story, I felt the movie and the book don't know about one another. Because would Triton really regress that much from seeing Ariel save the kingdom and her sister-- to being like "I'm gonna emotionally abuse you for going to shipwrecks." But Disney has a habit of doing this. It's not the first "prequel" novel to not communicate with its film. Cruella has a book also that doesn't make sense either. I feel like if Disney is going to keep doing this-- the books have to actually have an impact on the films in some way.
Firstly, I loved that we got back story on the sisters and how this version of the kingdom worked. The sisters were protectors of different oceans-- their voice was their power and they all had different powers when they came of age that their mother taught them.
Can we take a moment to realize that Disney dropped a ball. So, the guards in the kingdom are what they call "sea monsters" -- hot dudes with fins that are bad asses. I was like, "wait a minute! Why aren't they in the movie!" Because the book sets up that this was a big thing in the kingdom. Not only was there hot sea monsters but Ariel writes a law to give
them equal rights.
Ariel's father is a subject of issue for me. Not only a narcissist, but a misogynist also. Ariel, along with her sister Pearla, saved the kingdom and their sister Mala. The other thing is there is merhunters, and they aren't human. They are other fishfolk who sell their scales.
While I'm excited this gave us back story, I felt the movie and the book don't know about one another. Because would Triton really regress that much from seeing Ariel save the kingdom and her sister-- to being like "I'm gonna emotionally abuse you for going to shipwrecks." But Disney has a habit of doing this. It's not the first "prequel" novel to not communicate with its film. Cruella has a book also that doesn't make sense either. I feel like if Disney is going to keep doing this-- the books have to actually have an impact on the films in some way.
May 8, 2023
The Little Mermaid: Against the Tide by J. Elle
“You can’t define an entire species by the actions of one or two.”
~~~
I absolutely loved this novel with this new version of Ariel and all her sisters! J. Elle did an amazing job with this story. Loved also seeing the characteristics of Ariel’s other sisters for this plot.
There was also the mention of Ariel’s mother just like the Disney movies. J. Elle just did an amazing job, I can’t stress that enough; there is so much more to this book too. Everyone should put this on their TBR. Especially if ya love Ariel and anything The Little Mermaid.
“You can’t define an entire species by the actions of one or two.”
~~~
I absolutely loved this novel with this new version of Ariel and all her sisters! J. Elle did an amazing job with this story. Loved also seeing the characteristics of Ariel’s other sisters for this plot.
There was also the mention of Ariel’s mother just like the Disney movies. J. Elle just did an amazing job, I can’t stress that enough; there is so much more to this book too. Everyone should put this on their TBR. Especially if ya love Ariel and anything The Little Mermaid.
May 7, 2023
Such a great prequel to the movie. However, I feel like those who don’t read it are missing out on key moments and information about Ariel and her sisters! I’m curious how the movie will now be for those of us who read it versus those who hadn’t lol I mean this shows how she met Flounder, her sister’s relationships, the whole sea monster/mermaid politics, her mother! It’s a quick read and I highly recommend for anyone who loves mermaids and fantasy in general. You don’t need to be a Disney fan to like this story.
November 21, 2024
Was a DNF for me. The storyline seemed cute and different, but I couldn't get past the juvenile writing style. (I'm aware this is a YA book/author and I typically enjoy them as good "pallette cleansers", so take my review with a grain of salt.)
February 13, 2025
I'm not the age group for this book. Ariel is my favorite disney princess. It was nice to revisit the world of the little mermaid and spend time with the characters; some we know well and some we don't know so well.
May 17, 2023
Per leggere la recensione in blog cliccare qui:
https://ilconfinedeilibri.blogspot.co...
https://ilconfinedeilibri.blogspot.co...
May 25, 2023
Quick and fun read before the movie comes out!
June 14, 2023
As an adult it was a fun entertaining quick read. The book was really cute and the story was interesting. I think children and teens would also enjoy it.
June 15, 2023
there’s definitely plot holes and discrepancies, but there are just as many (or more) in Ariel’s Beginning (the prequel movie). Overall, it’s a charming sister story with family at the center
September 6, 2023
Wasn’t a huge fan of the writing style and am unsure how it’ll connect to the movie. I thought the movie was heavily based on the old one and therefore have little idea how much this story (while interesting) will actually play into the movie.
July 13, 2024
Please be aware that this review is full of spoilers for the book. I could not adequately write it otherwise.
First things first. I want to apologize because I "read" the audio version of this book during a long trip, which means I might spell some names wrong. Please forgive me for that... I don't have the option to look back and make sure everything is spelled properly. I did search for a summary, but there aren't any that aren't "spoiler free," so I'll have to just do my best. So here we go.
I was really excited about this book, because The Little Mermaid really defined my interest in animation in a lot of ways. In short, if you don't want to read the full review, I'm giving the book 3 stars for the plot, and I had to take two stars away for the execution of it.
So, to start: I read a lot of middle grade, because the plots are much more whimsical and fun than a lot of YA and Adult books. I also find that authors who typically write for adults and don't read children's books tend to really talk down to children, and I think that's what happened here.
I would give any Animorphs book (with few exceptions) 5 stars. I'd give ANYTHING by Applegate 5 stars! I'd give most Babysitter's Club books 4-5 stars. I gave most of the Wings of Fire books 5 stars. I say all this because I know what makes a good book for this age group, and I've often been moved to tears by books that are well-written. This book did not move me to tears. It didn't even make me care for the characters a whole lot. There was enough that was "okay" about the plot that I had to rate it better than two stars, but there's too much wrong with it to give it more than three.
I'll start with the setting itself.
Under the ocean, to most people, is a completely alien world. But there's no culture developed for the mermaids and sea creatures who live there. Of course there's mentions of kelp and shells and "the seas," et cetera. But something's strangely vacant about all of it, like the writer put a weak veneer on a regular old above-the-ocean fantasy drama. Description is lacking... I'm not even looking for purple prose here. In some cases, I'm looking for description *at all.* The sea monsters are of particular interest, but there's no true indication of what they look like, besides a few disjointed descriptions here and there.
Along those same lines, the author is extremely lazy with writing the size of the ocean, and has condensed all the seas into one easily-accessible body of water. The characters can travel from the Arctic Sea to the Mediterranean in a couple hours. If the author really wanted to include every sea, there should have been more an indication of a lot of time passing.
And yes, this is even with the "fast fins" McGuffin that allows mermaids to swim ten times faster than normal. Because first, I don't know how fast a mermaid can swim. Dolphins swim around 15 MPH easily. So does this mean with fast fins, a mermaid can swim 150 MPH? How do they avoid running into things like debris and other fish? Are there roads for fast fin use? And even if they're traveling that fast without restriction, it still wouldn't get them across the entire planet in a couple hours.
There is obviously magic in this world. Why not create portals between the oceans? I dunno. I just never bought the fast fin thing. The math didn't add up.
I mean, it really wasn't even necessary to have Ariel travel all over the world. It could have all been simplified by making the whole book take place in an area the size of a large city. We didn't need different oceans to showcase different colors (which seemed to indicate when Ariel was in a different type of ocean). Why not do what Zootopia did and create different environments in one place? The Protector plot even still could have happened, with different mermaids watching over different parts of this city. It makes far more sense, and it also doesn't ruin the continuum between the book and the movie. But more on that later.
Before I get into the plot, I want to talk about my one pet peeve with children's books, which occurs in Against the Tide pretty often. That is: treating kids like they're idiots.
When I watch or read media, I really don't read to "solve" the problem. I like to gather the clues in my head and see how it all turns out in the end. I don't want to analyze. I don't want to spend my time poring over hints to see if I can guess the reveal before the story takes me there. That is to say, I don't really LOOK for solutions. I wait to see what happens.
In this case, I could not help predicting the villain by chapter two, because the author does the written equivalent of hanging a flashing neon sign on Usenge which says "this is the villain." Before he even has lines--before he even appears on the page--Ariel has a huge section of meta-text where she describes how wonderful he is. How he's always loved their family. How he's the only sea monster Triton trusts without a hint of doubt. How he's never done anything wrong, and he's a wonderful diplomat and all the people of the ocean love him.
You know. Setting him up to take a huge fall.
It's not always necessary to show rather than tell. Sometimes you just need to get information out. But in this case, there's a major character who has done nothing at all to show that he's this wonderful person. I have no compassion for him. I don't care about him. And the author never intends for the reader to like him at all.
Every time there's a chance for misdirection or other opportunity to lead the reader to a different conclusion, it's hammered home AGAIN just how wonderful Usenge is, with this undercurrent of him being severely offputting and creepy. This isn't the way a mystery should run. I shouldn't be able to correctly guess the bad guy before I even get into the real plot of the story. I kept hoping it was a clever set up and that I was wrong, but it really was that shallow.
I think it was written that way because the intended age group was middle grade... But here's the thing. Kids don't want to be talked down to. They don't need to have the answers shoved in their face, and they don't want a trophy for figuring things out. If I read this as a kid, I would have been extremely disappointed.
Now for the plot.
I'll start with what was good. It did have a strong beginning, middle, and end. While it was quite complicated (more on that later) I think the author did the best she could with the setting, and told a good, solid story. While the characters didn't really endear themselves to me like I'd hoped, I understood their motivations and their hopes. I knew what was at stake, and the plot, as a whole, was sound. It did have a good amount of originality, and attempted to use the resources of the ocean to facilitate the story. I like it. I didn't put the book down, and there wasn't a point where I said "what the heck was the author thinking?"
But it was just that. It was just "okay" to me.
It's fair to say that prequels are challenging to write, because at the end of the book, your story needs to taper into the status quo for the already-existing media. Unfortunately, Against the Tide fails to do that in a lot of ways, which is confusing to me. Even if the author had been asked to write this without seeing the movie first (which would have been a bad idea) she had the original Disney animated movie to watch instead. As the live action remakes are almost a page-for-page re-imagining of the animated scripts, it should have been easy.
The least egregious example of this failed connection is that there are sea monsters in the book--sea snakes, giant sharks with tusks, et cetera--but there are none of these in the movie. One of Ariel's sisters, Mala, es even married to one, but he just doesn't exist in the movie, nor is he even mentioned. Sea monsters as a species aren't mentioned, either, and they aren't even seen in the background of any shots.
In the book, the sisters are all assigned as "Protectors" of various oceans, but they seem to have lost these duties in the movie. This job isn't mentioned, and the sisters seem to live in Triton's palace instead of in their own oceans in the movie. I expected them to move back into Triton's palace at the end of the book so they could be there for the movie, but the book actually doubled down on the protector thing and made Ariel one, too. And she is not in her territory protecting it in the movie, that's for sure.
In fact, the worst problem between the book and the movie is Ariel herself. First, given what happened to her in the book, she should be a whole lot more wary of humans, and should have formed some well-earned biases against them. They did try to kill her, after all. And given that she seems completely ignorant of this in the movie, it's almost as if she forgot all about what happened to her and her mother.
Against the Tide was absolutely a coming of age story for Ariel, too. She proved herself as a competent person, displaying wisdom and intelligence far beyond her years, and even managed to humble Triton. Where did this all go in the movie? What happened between then and now? And why did Triton forget all the lessons he learned in the book to the point where he started treating Ariel like a small child again, rather than a grown adult? She proved her resourcefulness already. Why does she have to do it again?
It would have been so much more interesting to tell the FULL story of why Triton and Ursula are estranged, and why Ursula was exiled. The reason is given a single, almost throw-away page in the book, and it was the most interesting part of the whole story! Essentially, Ursula entered Triton's palace, told his wife (who is never given a name, weirdly) that her kids were in danger, and then because of Ursula's lie, mom was captured by humans and killed. That full story would have been so interesting! I would have loved to read why Ursula felt that way about her brother and sister-in-law, and why she did what she did. It would have been cool to read about Triton and Ursula's childhood.
There are a few other problems with the plot that weren't unforgivable... Flounder wasn't really treated like a friend, for example. It felt a lot like Ariel was using him through the whole book. The whole thing with the sisters fighting got a little tired after a while, and some of it was almost cartoonish. There's also some things that are repeated way too often and needed to be dialed back, like "brows kissing." I thought it was a unique way to say "knitted brows..." but only once. When it happened five or six times, it seemed really repetitive. That, and the fact that mermaids apparently instinctively rub their wrists together when they're upset. That got a little weird.
Most of the worst issues with the plot happened close to the end. Although there are some minor problems through the whole book, nothing compares to the point Ariel and Perla figure out who is actually responsible for everything. It just wasn't well-planned. This is unfortunately a spoiler, but I really can't go into the problem itself without spoiling the book.
The first issue was that Julia, the housekeeper, apparently witnessed Usenge kidnapping Mala, and never told anyone. That would have been fine had there actually been some sort of scene between the two of them showing this--IE, showing Usenge threatening Julia, or kidnapping her as well, or at least something to show the audience that he was the bad guy. This could have even been done without revealing his name by a skilled writer. As it stands, there's no conceivable reason Julia wouldn't have run right to Triton with this information, which, in my eyes, makes Julia worse of a villain in this book than Usenge.
I also find it insulting that Ariel tells this to Triton before she finds out that Julia also knew the identity of the kidnapper, but Triton doesn't believe this until Julia also admits that she saw everything. I don't know how else to explain that this didn't sit well with me at all, especially because, again, Triton had no interaction with Julia prior to this scene, which means the reader has no reason to believe the two of them had such a strong rapport.
You HAVE to show this stuff in books. Yes, even if you're writing for children. Yes, even if you're writing a whodunnit mystery. You have to write your connections into the story. You can't just state them and hope the reader doesn't notice you didn't do any of the work. I don't believe any of this. It doesn't work for me, and seems hollow, at best.
Next, after Triton finally believes that Usenge is the bad guy, one would think that the resulting fury would call for all hands on deck. After all, Mala is due to be handed over to mer-hunters within a couple hours, which means every second literally counts. The difference between life and death for Triton's daughter fits within the width of a single hair. A single action could make all the difference. A moment of inaction could doom Mala forever.
Which makes it odd when that's the time the author chooses for Ariel and Triton to have a very long heart to heart talk.
It kills the story's momentum entirely, which had been building until the point Triton finally believed who the kidnapper was. This would have been the point to push that momentum into overdrive--have some sort of powerful action that would lead to a heroic rescue. Ariel knows where Mala is, and Triton has the trident, which gives him an incredible amount of power. But instead of using this power to rescue his daughter, he and Ariel have a long talk about grief, and how Triton and his family never got over the loss of Ariel's mother. All this? It could have come later. At the end of the book, during the falling action. This just decimates and destroys the ticking clock mechanic the author set up earlier in the book and makes it seem unimportant.
Of course, Ariel did have a plan, which I won't talk about much here, because it was really unnecessary, and took up a whole lot of extremely valuable time. It involved getting a whole lot of the kingdom together to publicly point fingers at Usenge, which was just so unnecessary. The lack of urgency was on full display here, and this meeting was specifically because of another plot point created by the author that just complicated things WAY too much. That is, everyone in the kingdom hated Triton because Usenge was telling people he was murdering fish and feeding them to his daughters.
There was already enough tension with Mala being kidnapped, and this whole side quest created a huge political nightmare. We know very well, thanks to current world events, that a huge number of people caught in the throes of groupthink with not allow their opinions to change even when presented with absolute truth. Yet Against the Tide relies on this premise--that simply accusing Usenge and saying he caused everything will assuage the worries of the kingdom and get them back in Triton's corner.
But people who have made up their minds over a long period of time will require more work than this book did to undo those lies. At the very least, there is no reason for these angry people to believe in the systems Triton himself put in place to assure truths, because they no longer trust Triton. Angry and scared people do not listen to reason.
As written, this plotline would have taken many more chapters to resolve favorably. But since this book is a mystery and not a political thriller, the better option would have been to cut it entirely. Because it was not written well and wasn't even the focus of the book, cutting it would have strengthened every other plot thread, and would have allowed more time for each to work out the persistent problems.
I think the worst thing was the resolution of all the plots at the very end.
First, if you don't know what a "Deus ex Machina" is, in Latin, it means "god from the machine." It essentially means that an event occurs, or an item presents itself, which allows resolution of the plot out of a hopeless situation.
Against the Tide did set Ariel up through the book to receive her Deus ex Machina, but it was not earned so much as accidentally happened upon at just the right moment to save her and everyone else. Without it, she could not have survived. The book references that each daughter of Triton earned a mersong from their mother, who sang it to them when they were very young. The problem is, Ariel doesn't have one.
What she does have is a bracelet with a purple stone, which is where the memory of her mersong is stored. Rather than discovering the truth of it herself, Ariel instead breaks it by accident in the final struggle of the book, and the memory returns to her at just the right moment. Her mersong apparently causes blindness in everyone around her, and is just the right thing to allow her and Mala to escape.
Essentially, the characters did not plan this, nor did they "win" under their own power. This cheapens the resolution and makes the characters seem weaker than they actually are. While there is a struggle leading up to this point, the hopelessness was broken not by Ariel--or all the friends she made along the way--but by luck. The only thing I can say for it is that there were hints dropped throughout the book that Ariel would somehow find her mersong, but this wasn't the best way to do it.
In summary... I didn't hate this book. There was never a point where I wanted to put it down and not finish it. But it needed a lot of work.
First things first. I want to apologize because I "read" the audio version of this book during a long trip, which means I might spell some names wrong. Please forgive me for that... I don't have the option to look back and make sure everything is spelled properly. I did search for a summary, but there aren't any that aren't "spoiler free," so I'll have to just do my best. So here we go.
I was really excited about this book, because The Little Mermaid really defined my interest in animation in a lot of ways. In short, if you don't want to read the full review, I'm giving the book 3 stars for the plot, and I had to take two stars away for the execution of it.
So, to start: I read a lot of middle grade, because the plots are much more whimsical and fun than a lot of YA and Adult books. I also find that authors who typically write for adults and don't read children's books tend to really talk down to children, and I think that's what happened here.
I would give any Animorphs book (with few exceptions) 5 stars. I'd give ANYTHING by Applegate 5 stars! I'd give most Babysitter's Club books 4-5 stars. I gave most of the Wings of Fire books 5 stars. I say all this because I know what makes a good book for this age group, and I've often been moved to tears by books that are well-written. This book did not move me to tears. It didn't even make me care for the characters a whole lot. There was enough that was "okay" about the plot that I had to rate it better than two stars, but there's too much wrong with it to give it more than three.
I'll start with the setting itself.
Under the ocean, to most people, is a completely alien world. But there's no culture developed for the mermaids and sea creatures who live there. Of course there's mentions of kelp and shells and "the seas," et cetera. But something's strangely vacant about all of it, like the writer put a weak veneer on a regular old above-the-ocean fantasy drama. Description is lacking... I'm not even looking for purple prose here. In some cases, I'm looking for description *at all.* The sea monsters are of particular interest, but there's no true indication of what they look like, besides a few disjointed descriptions here and there.
Along those same lines, the author is extremely lazy with writing the size of the ocean, and has condensed all the seas into one easily-accessible body of water. The characters can travel from the Arctic Sea to the Mediterranean in a couple hours. If the author really wanted to include every sea, there should have been more an indication of a lot of time passing.
And yes, this is even with the "fast fins" McGuffin that allows mermaids to swim ten times faster than normal. Because first, I don't know how fast a mermaid can swim. Dolphins swim around 15 MPH easily. So does this mean with fast fins, a mermaid can swim 150 MPH? How do they avoid running into things like debris and other fish? Are there roads for fast fin use? And even if they're traveling that fast without restriction, it still wouldn't get them across the entire planet in a couple hours.
There is obviously magic in this world. Why not create portals between the oceans? I dunno. I just never bought the fast fin thing. The math didn't add up.
I mean, it really wasn't even necessary to have Ariel travel all over the world. It could have all been simplified by making the whole book take place in an area the size of a large city. We didn't need different oceans to showcase different colors (which seemed to indicate when Ariel was in a different type of ocean). Why not do what Zootopia did and create different environments in one place? The Protector plot even still could have happened, with different mermaids watching over different parts of this city. It makes far more sense, and it also doesn't ruin the continuum between the book and the movie. But more on that later.
Before I get into the plot, I want to talk about my one pet peeve with children's books, which occurs in Against the Tide pretty often. That is: treating kids like they're idiots.
When I watch or read media, I really don't read to "solve" the problem. I like to gather the clues in my head and see how it all turns out in the end. I don't want to analyze. I don't want to spend my time poring over hints to see if I can guess the reveal before the story takes me there. That is to say, I don't really LOOK for solutions. I wait to see what happens.
In this case, I could not help predicting the villain by chapter two, because the author does the written equivalent of hanging a flashing neon sign on Usenge which says "this is the villain." Before he even has lines--before he even appears on the page--Ariel has a huge section of meta-text where she describes how wonderful he is. How he's always loved their family. How he's the only sea monster Triton trusts without a hint of doubt. How he's never done anything wrong, and he's a wonderful diplomat and all the people of the ocean love him.
You know. Setting him up to take a huge fall.
It's not always necessary to show rather than tell. Sometimes you just need to get information out. But in this case, there's a major character who has done nothing at all to show that he's this wonderful person. I have no compassion for him. I don't care about him. And the author never intends for the reader to like him at all.
Every time there's a chance for misdirection or other opportunity to lead the reader to a different conclusion, it's hammered home AGAIN just how wonderful Usenge is, with this undercurrent of him being severely offputting and creepy. This isn't the way a mystery should run. I shouldn't be able to correctly guess the bad guy before I even get into the real plot of the story. I kept hoping it was a clever set up and that I was wrong, but it really was that shallow.
I think it was written that way because the intended age group was middle grade... But here's the thing. Kids don't want to be talked down to. They don't need to have the answers shoved in their face, and they don't want a trophy for figuring things out. If I read this as a kid, I would have been extremely disappointed.
Now for the plot.
I'll start with what was good. It did have a strong beginning, middle, and end. While it was quite complicated (more on that later) I think the author did the best she could with the setting, and told a good, solid story. While the characters didn't really endear themselves to me like I'd hoped, I understood their motivations and their hopes. I knew what was at stake, and the plot, as a whole, was sound. It did have a good amount of originality, and attempted to use the resources of the ocean to facilitate the story. I like it. I didn't put the book down, and there wasn't a point where I said "what the heck was the author thinking?"
But it was just that. It was just "okay" to me.
It's fair to say that prequels are challenging to write, because at the end of the book, your story needs to taper into the status quo for the already-existing media. Unfortunately, Against the Tide fails to do that in a lot of ways, which is confusing to me. Even if the author had been asked to write this without seeing the movie first (which would have been a bad idea) she had the original Disney animated movie to watch instead. As the live action remakes are almost a page-for-page re-imagining of the animated scripts, it should have been easy.
The least egregious example of this failed connection is that there are sea monsters in the book--sea snakes, giant sharks with tusks, et cetera--but there are none of these in the movie. One of Ariel's sisters, Mala, es even married to one, but he just doesn't exist in the movie, nor is he even mentioned. Sea monsters as a species aren't mentioned, either, and they aren't even seen in the background of any shots.
In the book, the sisters are all assigned as "Protectors" of various oceans, but they seem to have lost these duties in the movie. This job isn't mentioned, and the sisters seem to live in Triton's palace instead of in their own oceans in the movie. I expected them to move back into Triton's palace at the end of the book so they could be there for the movie, but the book actually doubled down on the protector thing and made Ariel one, too. And she is not in her territory protecting it in the movie, that's for sure.
In fact, the worst problem between the book and the movie is Ariel herself. First, given what happened to her in the book, she should be a whole lot more wary of humans, and should have formed some well-earned biases against them. They did try to kill her, after all. And given that she seems completely ignorant of this in the movie, it's almost as if she forgot all about what happened to her and her mother.
Against the Tide was absolutely a coming of age story for Ariel, too. She proved herself as a competent person, displaying wisdom and intelligence far beyond her years, and even managed to humble Triton. Where did this all go in the movie? What happened between then and now? And why did Triton forget all the lessons he learned in the book to the point where he started treating Ariel like a small child again, rather than a grown adult? She proved her resourcefulness already. Why does she have to do it again?
It would have been so much more interesting to tell the FULL story of why Triton and Ursula are estranged, and why Ursula was exiled. The reason is given a single, almost throw-away page in the book, and it was the most interesting part of the whole story! Essentially, Ursula entered Triton's palace, told his wife (who is never given a name, weirdly) that her kids were in danger, and then because of Ursula's lie, mom was captured by humans and killed. That full story would have been so interesting! I would have loved to read why Ursula felt that way about her brother and sister-in-law, and why she did what she did. It would have been cool to read about Triton and Ursula's childhood.
There are a few other problems with the plot that weren't unforgivable... Flounder wasn't really treated like a friend, for example. It felt a lot like Ariel was using him through the whole book. The whole thing with the sisters fighting got a little tired after a while, and some of it was almost cartoonish. There's also some things that are repeated way too often and needed to be dialed back, like "brows kissing." I thought it was a unique way to say "knitted brows..." but only once. When it happened five or six times, it seemed really repetitive. That, and the fact that mermaids apparently instinctively rub their wrists together when they're upset. That got a little weird.
Most of the worst issues with the plot happened close to the end. Although there are some minor problems through the whole book, nothing compares to the point Ariel and Perla figure out who is actually responsible for everything. It just wasn't well-planned. This is unfortunately a spoiler, but I really can't go into the problem itself without spoiling the book.
The first issue was that Julia, the housekeeper, apparently witnessed Usenge kidnapping Mala, and never told anyone. That would have been fine had there actually been some sort of scene between the two of them showing this--IE, showing Usenge threatening Julia, or kidnapping her as well, or at least something to show the audience that he was the bad guy. This could have even been done without revealing his name by a skilled writer. As it stands, there's no conceivable reason Julia wouldn't have run right to Triton with this information, which, in my eyes, makes Julia worse of a villain in this book than Usenge.
I also find it insulting that Ariel tells this to Triton before she finds out that Julia also knew the identity of the kidnapper, but Triton doesn't believe this until Julia also admits that she saw everything. I don't know how else to explain that this didn't sit well with me at all, especially because, again, Triton had no interaction with Julia prior to this scene, which means the reader has no reason to believe the two of them had such a strong rapport.
You HAVE to show this stuff in books. Yes, even if you're writing for children. Yes, even if you're writing a whodunnit mystery. You have to write your connections into the story. You can't just state them and hope the reader doesn't notice you didn't do any of the work. I don't believe any of this. It doesn't work for me, and seems hollow, at best.
Next, after Triton finally believes that Usenge is the bad guy, one would think that the resulting fury would call for all hands on deck. After all, Mala is due to be handed over to mer-hunters within a couple hours, which means every second literally counts. The difference between life and death for Triton's daughter fits within the width of a single hair. A single action could make all the difference. A moment of inaction could doom Mala forever.
Which makes it odd when that's the time the author chooses for Ariel and Triton to have a very long heart to heart talk.
It kills the story's momentum entirely, which had been building until the point Triton finally believed who the kidnapper was. This would have been the point to push that momentum into overdrive--have some sort of powerful action that would lead to a heroic rescue. Ariel knows where Mala is, and Triton has the trident, which gives him an incredible amount of power. But instead of using this power to rescue his daughter, he and Ariel have a long talk about grief, and how Triton and his family never got over the loss of Ariel's mother. All this? It could have come later. At the end of the book, during the falling action. This just decimates and destroys the ticking clock mechanic the author set up earlier in the book and makes it seem unimportant.
Of course, Ariel did have a plan, which I won't talk about much here, because it was really unnecessary, and took up a whole lot of extremely valuable time. It involved getting a whole lot of the kingdom together to publicly point fingers at Usenge, which was just so unnecessary. The lack of urgency was on full display here, and this meeting was specifically because of another plot point created by the author that just complicated things WAY too much. That is, everyone in the kingdom hated Triton because Usenge was telling people he was murdering fish and feeding them to his daughters.
There was already enough tension with Mala being kidnapped, and this whole side quest created a huge political nightmare. We know very well, thanks to current world events, that a huge number of people caught in the throes of groupthink with not allow their opinions to change even when presented with absolute truth. Yet Against the Tide relies on this premise--that simply accusing Usenge and saying he caused everything will assuage the worries of the kingdom and get them back in Triton's corner.
But people who have made up their minds over a long period of time will require more work than this book did to undo those lies. At the very least, there is no reason for these angry people to believe in the systems Triton himself put in place to assure truths, because they no longer trust Triton. Angry and scared people do not listen to reason.
As written, this plotline would have taken many more chapters to resolve favorably. But since this book is a mystery and not a political thriller, the better option would have been to cut it entirely. Because it was not written well and wasn't even the focus of the book, cutting it would have strengthened every other plot thread, and would have allowed more time for each to work out the persistent problems.
I think the worst thing was the resolution of all the plots at the very end.
First, if you don't know what a "Deus ex Machina" is, in Latin, it means "god from the machine." It essentially means that an event occurs, or an item presents itself, which allows resolution of the plot out of a hopeless situation.
Against the Tide did set Ariel up through the book to receive her Deus ex Machina, but it was not earned so much as accidentally happened upon at just the right moment to save her and everyone else. Without it, she could not have survived. The book references that each daughter of Triton earned a mersong from their mother, who sang it to them when they were very young. The problem is, Ariel doesn't have one.
What she does have is a bracelet with a purple stone, which is where the memory of her mersong is stored. Rather than discovering the truth of it herself, Ariel instead breaks it by accident in the final struggle of the book, and the memory returns to her at just the right moment. Her mersong apparently causes blindness in everyone around her, and is just the right thing to allow her and Mala to escape.
Essentially, the characters did not plan this, nor did they "win" under their own power. This cheapens the resolution and makes the characters seem weaker than they actually are. While there is a struggle leading up to this point, the hopelessness was broken not by Ariel--or all the friends she made along the way--but by luck. The only thing I can say for it is that there were hints dropped throughout the book that Ariel would somehow find her mersong, but this wasn't the best way to do it.
In summary... I didn't hate this book. There was never a point where I wanted to put it down and not finish it. But it needed a lot of work.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
May 3, 2023
3.5 Stars ✨
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