The Mermaid's Child

by Jo Baker

When Malin’s father dies, he leaves behind only his fantastical story that her mother was a mermaid. Set in an unspecified historical past, full of strange and wonderful characters, the story follows Malin’s picaresque journey across oceans and continents, towards an unexpected discovery.

Genres: Fiction, Fantasy, Historical Fiction, Mermaids, Magical Realism, Adult, Audiobook

272 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2004

About the author

Jo Baker is the author of six novels, most recently Longbourn and A Country Road, A Tree. She has also written for BBC Radio 4, and her short stories have been included in a number of anthologies. She lives in Lancaster, England, with her husband, the playwright and screenwriter Daragh Carville, and their two children.

Reviews

[Elyse Walters · Rating 3 out of 5]

Jo Baker's writing slices down in the core of your heart! Many of her phrases and sentences are so wrenching ....that in my imagination of imaginations --- I just didn't want to visualize the things I was reading at times.

I deeply appreciate the authors talents --I hope to read more by Jo Baker --but this story --kinda gave me the 'chilly-willies' ...creepy-yuckies. I'm not sure what I was expecting to read when I picked this novel ---but I didn't expect what I got.
"He hit me. A crack to the jaw as if the bone had burst open. My head flew back; I staggered and was held. I blinked, slid my tongue round my teeth, tasted blood.

This is the type of girl *Malin Reed* is: "I was pretty well use to not being wanted. And despite the fact that my skull now seemed to be squeezing my brain like a sponge, and my skin was rough as cows' tongues in cold, and there was bile in my mouth, I wouldn't consider myself defeated".


Abuse--struggles -poverty--- 'hope' (a Shark's tooth for good luck) -- more struggles --more abuse -more hope ---(the cycle continues)

Searching for her mother, Malin has a dream: "I had been dreaming, swimming, weightlessly twisting through the green water. My mother was swimming there beside me, translucent, just out-of-sight, and when I turned my head just gone".

This is a very different type of story with chilling moments. My 'ying/yang' reactions felt off balance. Mostly --this story wasn't the best fit for me. It might be for another reader.

[Megan Baxter · Rating 4 out of 5]

I knew very little about this book before sitting down to read it, and had never delved into this author's works before. I was not at all sure what to expect. It didn't take long to get sucked in, although this was, by turns, a much darker book than I had been expecting. When all you know is that it's about a girl who thinks her mother might have been a mermaid, you're not expecting a 19th-century tale of sexual coercion and prostitution.

Note: The rest of this review has been withheld due to the changes in Goodreads policy and enforcement. You can read why I came to this decision here.

In the meantime, you can read the entire review at Smorgasbook

[Rebecca · Rating 3 out of 5]

This was Baker’s second novel, originally published in 2004. It doesn’t nearly live up to Longbourn, but it’s a fairly intriguing blend of historical fiction and fantasy. Malin’s father was a ferryman; her absent mother, so he swears, was a mermaid. After her father dies and she goes to work in the local pub, a peculiar man comes to town during a drought and seems to make it rain. Later it turns out he’s a swindler, but to start with he seems like a miracle worker, and Malin decides to make him her ticket out of town. Jebb, the scholar-sailor who rescues her from the open ocean, and Marguerite, the no-longer-fat Fat Lady of the circus, are two similarly unusual future saviors. In all her travels, whether in circuses or at sea, Malin is constantly searching for her mother; “All I’d ever wanted was someone to love.”

The Mermaid’s Child is curiously timeless and placeless. At first glance it seems to be set in England in the recent past, until Malin winds up on board a slave ship. Early 1800s, then? It’s also difficult to gauge Malin’s initial age, which is why it’s particularly creepy when she joins Joe on the road and they become lovers. Malin goes through so many identity shifts that the book seems like a piece of magic realism at times: a town prostitute, a disguised sailor, the sole crew member aboard Jebb’s floating library, a slave in a desert encampment, and a tightrope walker in the same circus where she once looked for her mother. As Baker writes, “It’s the nature of myth to be old...anything recent is just a reworking of the old stories.”

In spite of her adventuresome quest, Malin isn’t a very endearing character. I like that the book returns full-circle, delivering Malin back to the very cottage where she grew up, but her travels seem a jumble – too vague for historical fiction and too concrete for fantasy. The settings and experiences are all vivid, but somehow it doesn’t all come together.


Related reading:
• She Rises by Kate Worsley
• The Ocean at the End of the Lane by Neil Gaiman
• The Museum of Extraordinary Things by Alice Hoffman

[Marianna · Rating 1 out of 5]

Well, I'm not sure where to begin with this book. First, I'd like to say that I received this book through NetGalley for an honest review... Over the last few years, I have read many books and usually, I like them. In this case, I'm almost stunned into silence... There is much I want to say and yet I almost can't find the words to say it in.

I can't say that this book was horrible, but yet it was. This is definitely not the kind of book I enjoy - others may, but not for me. There were moments where the writing was amazing, the story started to flow and I began to love the characters and then within a sentence that entire feeling would dissipate and I would ask myself the question, "why am I reading this book?" Many times I wanted to just stop reading it and put it down, but I have never walked away from a book - no matter what.

Spoilers Alert!!!! If you don't want to read on, now is the time to stop. If you want a one paragraph summary of the story then here it is....

The story itself was NOT what I expected at all... The description of the book led me to believe that this was going to be a fantasy of sorts that included mermaids and other wonderful creatures. The reality was far from it... Our main character Malin, is an unwanted child. After her father dies, her grandmother gives her away into a bar as child labor. There she is beat and mistreated. This is the beginning of a horribly sad story as this poor girl leaves her home town to follow a stranger into an unknown and soon to be horrible future. She goes from being an innocent to being made into a prostitute to signing up to work on a slave ship as a boy, to floating in the ocean with a scholar, to being kidnapped by pirates and sold into slavery, to joining a circus, to getting pregnant and ending up back in her own original childhood village to give birth. AND story over! Quiet frankly, I could not believe how the story ended... After all that, it just stopped. No inventive conclusion. No future outlook. NO ending... I just could not believe it. It just stopped. At the end, I understood that Malin, our main character, supposedly wrote her story down for her child (we don't even get to find out if this child is a son or a daughter), but the story seemed to have no rhyme or reason.

Let's discuss the writing... I can't claim that I'm a good writer; however, I have read lots of books that were wonderfully written. Ms. Jo Baker seems to be conflicted in her writing style... As I mentioned above, there were pages that I read that were written beautifully. I wanted to keep reading. I was engaged with the story. And then, just as quickly, the style turned and I could not understand what was being said. There were vocabulary words that were not in the dictionary, there were run on sentences, there were unusual sentence structures. I had to read and reread certain sections 2 and 3 times. I was so torn between wanting to throw my kindle across the room from frustration or to hold on to it and keep reading. So frustrating! Additionally, the flow of the story was at times wonderful and at times just horrifying. I would be reading a great passage, enjoying the story and out of the blue a curve ball was thrown so hard that I nearly jumped out of my seat, sitting there with my mouth hung open with disbelieve, going back a few pages thinking that I misunderstood and rereading the section just to be hit with the same shock. Malin's situations changed so fast that the reader had no time to adjust to the coming change and at times unable to understand that the change happened. Malin experienced so many near-death situations that all of it became unbelievable.

At the end, my thoughts are confused. On one hand I think that this story has some potential. On the other hand, I think this story is just a jumbled mess that needs a huge reworking. Honestly, I think that it would have been better if Ms. Jo Baker would have written this story as a series instead of jumbling it all into one book. It seems that each experience that Malin had should have been more detailed, better explained. Instead I felt dragged through the entire story having little to hold on to and understand. While the effort is greatly appreciated, this story is just not for me.... sorry.

[Ann (Inky Labyrinth) · Rating 2 out of 5]

The weather went from 80 to 50 in a day or so, which means I'm having a painful week, but I finished this beauty!

Jo Baker's writing is lyrical and just beautiful. The story ultimately was forgettable, I'm sorry to say. I still would like to give another book of hers a try.

[Alisha Marie · Rating 2 out of 5]

Oh, the disappointment! The synopsis of The Mermaid's Child sounded fantastic. Mermaids! Circuses! Mythical Inheritances! Intriguing, right? Well, unfortunately, all of that together was just a mish-mash of boring.

I love fantasy novels. Being transported to a mythical world is one of the great pleasures of reading. I had assumed that The Mermaid's Child would do this. But it didn't...not even a little bit. And that has a lot to do with the fact that I was never engaged in The Mermaid's Child. I kept reading in the hopes that I would turn the page and I would magically be invested in...everything; in Malin, in her journey and her quest to find the answers on her mom. But it never happened. After I hit page 150, I decided that I would just grit my teeth, stop expecting anything more from it, and just finish it.

Basically, I found The Mermaid's Child to be incredibly boring, the writing was average, the characterization was average, and the book as a whole was just not something that I feel I should have invested my time in. I say, skip it.

[Cheryl · Rating 1 out of 5]

This book should be such a fun read. The concept of the story makes you want to read it and instantly think it will take you on a magical journey ride. I had to make myself read this book to the tenth chapter. There was nothing exciting or charming about this book. Malin's grandparents are awful and put the whole family down. I had no desire to read further and find out if Malin finds her happy ending.

[Lindley · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book was quite different from what I expected, based on the description. When it's described as a fairy tale for adults, think more Grimm than Disney. Malin's journey is a hard one, full of both pain and pleasure, love and cruelty. Jo Baker does not shy away from the most difficult parts of the journey, and at times I found it a bit hard to read. Although many parts of this book are beautifully written, I had this feeling as though there was a wall between Malin and the reader--it was hard for me to ever connect with the character. For such a driven character, it seemed like events happened to her for the majority of the story, rather than her having a real sense of agency. Malin developed more control over her life toward the end of the story, but it ended quite abruptly.

[Robert · Rating 4 out of 5]

An odd book, but strangely compelling. The library had marked this volume as fantasy, wrongly in my opinion, but there was something magical about the whole thing despite the wanton cruelty and mainly, though not always, coerced sex. Our heroine, Malin, somehow seems able to remain almost untouched through disaster on disaster, but all the way through there are glimpses of love.
Not my kind of book, but I couldn't put it down.

[Emma Ann · Rating 2 out of 5]

Baker writes with a startling beauty. But this book never successfully manages (imho) to meld fantasy and history.

[Carole P. Roman · Rating 3 out of 5]

I loved Longbourne and was excited to read another book by Jo Baker. The description sounded like a departure from her other book, but the storyline seemed enticing enough.
I can't fault Baker's writing style. She's descriptive and used the English language like a sculptor. Her imagery is gorgeous, her language strung together like luminous pearls on a necklace. The plot and characters are where she lost me. Set in an unspecified time in England, Malin is the wild child of a poor ferryman, neglected by a disinterested grandmother. She yearns to find her mother, describes as a whore by her grandmother and a mermaid by her father. Her dad dies, she is thrown into an indentured type of job with a rough character and she begins a hero's journey to find her mother.
My complaint is that the book does not ring true. It's a wild fantasy ride. Malin lives in a Mad Max kind of world rather than I suppose fifteenth or sixteen-century Europe. The man she meets feel more like a fey Fagan a la Oliver Twist (that would be the 19th century), the circus seemed totally out of sync with the times, in fact, it had a more fantasy aspect, as did her stint on the slaver. At times, brutal, the violence was hard to read, at other times it felt like science fiction-like, the book felt like a long useless journey, until Malin discovers the meaning of her search. I looked up the book after I finished it and realized it was an early work. That said, it explained a lot. I think Baker is a fine author and in a way, I enjoyed seeing the difference in her talent as she grows.

[Orange Cat · Rating 1 out of 5]

The blurb about this kids you into thinking its a happy fantasy novel. Don't be fooled like I was. It's unremittingly miserable abusive and gruesome. She doesn't go to work in the pub as stated in another review she is sold into slavery to the publican by her grandmother who hates and abuses her and starves her like everyone else in her childhood.
Then she runs away with a man who she supposes to be magical but who is a conman traveling from town to town, who uses her sexually and when his luck is down sells her into prostitution then loses her in a card game to the nastiest pimp in the town, at which point she being dressed as a boy signs for 5 years on a slaver boat. Here she is again abused but we also get to hear about the dreadful deaths of the negro slaves and their children. I started skimming at this point. From the skimming I get to read the nice old man's bones are crunched after he is shot by the pirates who then sell her as a slave. For some reason everyone seems to hate and her at first sight. She alludes to her attitude but we don't see it.
It's told in first person but we never get to know her or what she looks like.
There is no mermaid, she seems to meet one when she has a fever -most likely delirious. And hears some of the boat - probably she's insane at the time. Mermaid is apparently acronym for prostitute. The discovery is also a disappointment. She finds love in her child but God knows what nightmares are going to be in store for the two of them after the end of the novel.

[Sharon Malcolm · Rating 3 out of 5]

A motherless child grows up unwanted and uneducated in an isolated village on an isolated island, believing her mother is a mermaid. Given away by her grandmother into virtual slavery, she escapes town with a wandering vagabond and embarks on an adventure - of sorts - to find her mother that takes her to some amazing places - not all of them geographical. Admittedly, it was sometimes hard to work out what was really happening in this fantastical piece of imaginative storytelling. However, the page kept turning to see what on earth was going to happen to poor Malin next as she seems to constantly fall out of the proverbial frying pan, and into the proverbial fire.

[Maria · Rating 4 out of 5]

I was thinking that I would give The Mermaid's Child three stars, but then I got goosebumps as I finished reading, and decided that the story affected me enough to earn four.

Malin Reed has a hard life, surrounded by death, enslaved, lost, alone. She makes some questionable decisions, but keeps surviving. She reinvents herself many times, passing as male when she needs to. I found her strength inspiring, but some will find the struggles hard to read.

Jo Baker is a great storyteller and kept me enthralled even when I wished that she would give Malin a break.

[Laurie · Rating 4 out of 5]

I really enjoyed this book, and I'm surprised it isn't getting better ratings. It's the first book I read by Baker, and so perhaps it didn't live up to some of her others? I will check out more of her books myself because I think her writing is fantastic. I really cared about the main character and got sucked into her story. Baker paints a great picture with words. What's interesting about this book is that the main character is not really that bright or tough in the beginning, and hardly a hero of any kind. She grows through her journey by complete accident. The ending is beautiful.

[Karen O'Brien-Hall · Rating 1 out of 5]

The second novel by Jo Baker I've attempted to read. Whilst some of the prose is beautiful, mostly it is pedestrian. I wondered if this was a device, differentiating time and character, but decided after reading nearly a third of the book, the story had not engaged me and I didn't care to read any further to find out. Sorry not my kind of book.

[Kim Welliver · Rating 3 out of 5]

a lyrical writing style doesn't quite make up for a cast of unlikeable characters

[Elle Hartford · Rating 3 out of 5]

Okay, so, this book was written very lyrically, and it wasn't bad. The problem is that it is marketed as something very different than it is! The back cover blurb talks about mermaids and fantasy, and feels a bit uplifting--that is *not* what this book is. It seems to be more along the lines of historical fiction, and . . . well, not uplifting. A "meditation on an adventurous but lonely life of struggle" seems more appropriate. It's not the sort of thing I would read normally, and if the blurb had reflected that, I would have known to stay away, haha.

If you like historical fiction though, particularly about the visceral struggles of being a woman in a man's seafaring world, you'll probably love it!

[Helen - Great Reads & Tea Leaves · Rating 2 out of 5]

I excitedly took the opportunity to read Jo Baker’s novel after receiving so much enjoyment from her ‘Longbourn” tale. Firstly, I have issues with the blurb – um, it’s misleading. The description leads you to believe that it will be a fantasy tale, inclusively of mermaids somewhere throughout. This could not be further from the truth. Let me state right now, there is no fantasy and not a hint of magical realism. The reality of the situation is that this is a very dark, cruel story, a gruesome historical drama.

Full review at:
http://greatreadsandtealeaves.blogspo...

[Katy · Rating 1 out of 5]

I checked out the ebook from my local library's fantasy section. Despite the minor presence of mermaids, briefly, twice in the book, this is not really a fantasy book. It easily could have been, somewhere around halfway through when she finds her destination in the ocean.... but no.

This book should come with trigger warnings for sexual exploitation bordering on rape. repeatedly.

I also found the end unsatisfying. My final thoughts were something along the lines of 'this is some serious patriarchal bullcrap'.

But if you want to read the story of a neglected girl struggling through life on her own, have at it.

[Yarslov · Rating 2 out of 5]

This was nothing like the back of the book! I thought it would be an adult fairy-tale, but alas it is not.

The Mermaid's Child is timeless and place-less. All we know is this girl named Malin whom her father said that her mother was a mermaid. Many hardships befall her, and yet even in those hardships there is glimmer of hope in all.

It was a strange book, with passages beautifully written (which I cannot quote because I listened to it) and some was teeth gritting to get to the next part.

[Ellie Rhodes · Rating 2 out of 5]

I stuck with this book to the end. There was so much promise and then ... it just ended. I thought - is there a sequel? Now that I’ve finished it, I’m not really sure what it was about - searching for identity? searching for love? It was NOT like any of the descriptions I read about it. Fantasy? Not there.

[Heather · Rating 1 out of 5]

This book was so awful, y'all! I picked up because "oooh mermaids," but could barely get through it. It is a dark tale, which normally doesn't bother me, except there really isn't any good or hope to balance it out. I kept hoping it would get better, but it never did.

[Laura · Rating 2 out of 5]

Not a fantasy book. Less than magical, and darker than I was expecting. I kept reading to the end hoping to get to the fantasy and wonderful characters. Bit of a let-down on that front. Would not recommend it.

[C · Rating 2 out of 5]

*WARNING NOT A FANTASY BOOK READ AT OWN RISK*
Seriously what the hell was ...very disturbing and the end oh wait there's not ending smh would not recommend.

[Emily Marcum · Rating 1 out of 5]

I truly hated this book. It was depressing and hideous and had no redeeming qualities. Truly, a terrible book.

[NuevoRain · Rating 1 out of 5]

Dumb Dumb Dumb. I think trigger warnings are stupid until I come to a book like this where the protagonist is abused throughout. Stay away if that is not your thing.

[Janelle · Rating 3 out of 5]

The title and description was deceiving but I enjoyed the book nonetheless. Baker's writing is beautiful and brings forth a powerful imagery in every scene.

[Lindsay · Rating 1 out of 5]

I'm so mad that I wasted time reading this book. It had potential, but missed opportunities to be good.

[Phyllis C Surface · Rating 2 out of 5]

Two stars

Weird book. Sad and depressing read about a females tortured life while growing I to adulthood. Can't recommend this one