Deep

by Susanna Vance

Nothing really bad has ever happened to Birdie. And she hates it! She needs drama, angst, torment–something to provide fodder for the amazing book she wants to write. When her parents take a yearlong sabbatical to the Caribbean, she gets her wish. . . .

Morgan is a child of the sea. Raised by nomadic Norwegian parents who encouraged her to chart her own course, and filled with sorrow after the water claims her older sister, she attempts to create a new life for herself in the warm waters of the tropics. But before she can do that, she needs papers that will keep the Coast Guard away, And there's only one person she knows who can help her. Tricky Nicky. Morgan knows he's a shyster. But what she doesn't know is that he's a maniacal killer.

Told in alternating points of view, Deep is a riveting story that will pull readers into its depths.

Genres: Young Adult, Adventure, Fiction, Middle Grade, Survival, Crime

272 pages, Hardcover

First published May 13, 2003

Reviews

[Madeleine · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book is great. At the beginning it wasn't that interesting because I didn't really understand that they were building up to something intense. Then of course I got to the intense part and it was so good.

[Linda · Rating 5 out of 5]

This was a strange and amazing book. Took a whole different turn in the middle which sent the story on a thrilling ride with a great ending. I want more books from Susanna Vance. Both her SIGHTS and DEEP were so good!

[Krista · Rating 3 out of 5]

An extreamly lopsided book. Very slow and -where is this going?- starting then all of a sudden it's major action, suspence and then it washes back to calmer waters. It could be worth reading if you can stand the rollercoaster ride.

[Carly · Rating 1 out of 5]

Deep was a weird book, with odd characters and an even stranger plot. It was written in the points of view of two separate characters, Birdie and Morgan. Birdie Sidwell is a thirteen year old girl who wants to have her own adventure so she can write some sort of thrilling novel later on in life. Morgan is a “child of the sea” who is living her own lonely life of freedom.

The plot of the book was…questionable — Whilst Birdie is on vacation in the Caribbean with her family, she gets whisked off by some handsome kidnapper named Nicolas by boat. Birdie then spends the next days (months?) trapped in a boat, or being gaslighted by Nicolas. At the same time, Morgan is starting a new life of her own, after leaving her drunken and heartbroken parents behind. She travels alone by boat, and meets up with Nicolas because she needs his help getting a passport.

Read more of my review at my blog!
https://voraciousreader.wixsite.com/t...

[Meagan · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book was different from lot of books I have read. It was told from two different points of view switching back and forth between each chapter. It was a slow start but all in all an ok book

[Emily Bell · Rating 5 out of 5]

The reason I'm giving this book five stars is because it was one of my all-time favorites when I was about twelve. Re-reading ten years later, I certainly see some flaws, but Deep sparked so much creativity within me as a child that I have to give it credit today.

What I Liked
Both protagonists are vivid and lovable. Birdie is a little whiny and spoiled ("I am so awesome!"), but she is bright with the colors of life and fight. The relationship she has with her parents is precious to read, as many YA novels make the parents basically nonexistent. Morgan's story is heartbreaking and empowering. This girl is fierce.

I love the narration in this book. "I imagined the Nu-Way teachers and Mrs. Kimball taking turns flyswatting at her honeybee spirit until it turned waspy and mean." Deep is written for the younger end of the YA spectrum, as Birdie is only thirteen. Birdie captures the spirit of a thirteen-year-old, and Morgan captures the spirit of the wild adventurer with an itching wanderlust, someone that every young reader has inside of them.

Nicholas is a fantastic villain. Handsome, cunning, ever-changing appearance, and even more rapidly changing moods. A book with striking similarity is Stolen by Lucy Christopher (a book that I did not like for its depiction of a sexy, mysterious, 100% sympathetic, self-sacrificing captor). Unlike Stolen, Deep offers an antagonist that is both compelling and chillingly ominous. His manipulation and mind games cause the reader to hate and love him at the same time, and Birdie's confusion is entirely understandable.

What I Didn't Like
I realize that this is closer to middle grade than young adult, but everything turned out so darn perfectly. No PTSD for Birdie, after all of the horrendous trauma she's been through. No more asthma. Only fame, happiness, a publishing contract, and a brand new orange cell phone. No real contemplation about what happened to Nicholas and the other missing girls.

Things weren't wrapped up quite as tightly as I would have liked. What about all of the other "princesses" Nicholas talked about? For that matter, what happened to Nicholas? What was his sentencing?

At times, Birdie's perky personality made me laugh. Other times, it made me roll my eyes and sigh. At one point, she and Morgan are struggling to escape an extremely harrowing, dangerous, and painful situation, and Birdie manages to do something she didn't think she could do, and she exclaimed, "I am so awesome!" Meanwhile, she had just fallen next to a dead body, who was currently rotting below her as she climbed to the top of the well.

[Seoyoung Kim · Rating 4 out of 5]

Deep by Susanna Vance is a thriller and mystery surrounding the lives of two originally unrelated teenage girls: Birdie Sidwell and Morgan Bera. Birdie was a plain small town girl with low self-esteem who yearns for something interesting to happen in her life. Morgan was a sailor from birth who left her parents to now sail to discover a new life. Vance switches points of view between Birdie and Morgan to show the different lives they lead which their personalities are built upon.

On each of their new adventures, they both encounter an unseen evil and have to endure a life and death struggle. During their struggle, Birdie, who was fragile and easily broken, developed a new sense of self and learned to harden herself against the world, and Morgan, who had hardened herself in the past and shut the world out, learned to rely on others and grow as a person. Deep sends you a roller coaster of emotions from the unrestrained emotion to be free to the desire for a companion. Although the environment they grew up in and the unfortunate events they face may not be applicable to most teenagers, Vance made the characters Birdie and Morgan easy to be empathized with.

[Ben · Rating 4 out of 5]

Deep is a book following the story of two girls, one who is somewhat spoiled and seems to get whatever she desires, and the other is a girl born and lives on the sea with her family. I have not finished the book so I do not know the correlation between the two characters but it shows how dramatically different people’s lives can be, as one girl lives a normal life and her biggest problem is her friend being mad at her while another lives on the sea and relies on the misfortune of others to collect insurance money, she even left her own parents on an island because they turned into drunks and were irresponsible with the boat after her older sister got lost at sea. It could be that each girl wished that they were the other, one wanting to be adventurous and the other wanting to be normal. I do not know what the the theme is for this story but it does have some strong messages when looked into. Overall it is a good young adult book and since it has multiple characters and is quite unpredictable new things always happen and lets new settings develop.

[Aazimah]

Birdie is a teenage girl that is trying to find herself. This book sounds like any other typical teenage drama. However this one is different. She has a best friend Kirin, who became the next biggest thing. Now that her best friend has made new cooler friends, Birdie is just some lame who happens to be convent. Since people know the affiliation between the two girls, it some what makes Kirin feel like she’s a lame too. The suspense begin to build up between the two girls when Birdie finds out all the mean things Kirin is saying about her. She almost feelsb like she in a rut. Typical teenage drama can can make either turn.

This books makes the reader feel like they are in the middle of typical teenage drama. Its makes you feel like every teenage girls goes through the same idiotic drama. Breaking and making friendships that can turn out either way.

[Heather · Rating 3 out of 5]

I found this book to have an extremely slow start and at times I nearly gave up on it until the action finally started. The story is told from two alternating perspectives - Birdie, an only child of doting parents, and Morgan, who has spent her life on the sea. I enjoyed Morgan's story but had very little time for Birdie whom I found irritating, ignorant and spoilt. Unfortunately, despite the dramas and the two girls meeting, in the end very little had changed. Morgan sailed off into the sunset and Birdie remained her egotistical self, so I'm not sure if they learned anything from their experiences. I would be wary of whom I recommended this book to.

[Cathleen]

"Deep" by Susanna Vance is a realistic fiction type book with a questionable plot about an ordinary girl who takes a year-long vacation and a captain of a ship that abandons her own ship. Eventually, the two meet up. The is no apparent theme of the story, other than the idea of loneliness even when you're not alone. Both of the two main characters seem to be like circles trying to squeeze in a square door. I think that the story's plot is very questionable upon the idea of being realistic, but the suspense is definitely there. In our society today, so many people lock themselves up on their phones, making the idea of loneliness and isolation to a greater extent.

[Jenny · Rating 3 out of 5]

Birdie has lived a sheltered life in Riverton, Oregon, for 13 years. Now she is off on the trip of a lifetime with her family, a year in the Carribbean. Morgan has lived her whole life on the sea, and now that her parents are no longer functioning, she has set sail on her own. The two girls cross paths after Birdie is kidnapped by a crazed pirate named Nick. Morgan comes looking for his help in forging papers, but she is the one to help as both girls struggle to survive.

[Nathalie .]

I love how in this book, the author told the story from two people's perspectives. I had predicted that the two would meet each other sometime during the book. i could hardly put it down. I can see that most people didn't like it too much. The author's writing shows how different the two main characters are but how similar they are at the same time. Great book.

[Sarah Croker · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book started out on a very low note, I didn't enjoy it at all, but I am so glad I stuck with it because the twists and excitement and adventure in this book are worth the wait it takes to get to the good parts. Also, the characters grew on me and I found my self reading away the hours at times.

[Alexis Nicole]

This book was weird but it had to do with abduction. Don't get me wrong it was smooth sailing when i was reading but weird book filled with two-person point of view, psycho kidnapper/murderer,and two brave girls where i admire now.

[Karishma · Rating 1 out of 5]

This book was fairly okay until I reached the part where Birdie wants to make the 'best' out of a bad situation. The child was kidnapped and went through a stressful and disgusting situation. There's no 'good' in that.

[Kari · Rating 4 out of 5]

Found in a free-library box at the beach and a great youthful action packed story told in alternating voices. Birdie who has lived a life without challenge or excitement is actually headed to the Caribbean with her family to live for a year. Morgan was born and has lived her entire life on a boat in the Caribbean with hardships, joys and grief...her older sister and baby brother both died and her parents have turned to rum to drown their sorrows. These two young women have their lives intersect in a way I never saw coming when I picked up the book for some distraction during the quarantine....
Oregon Literary Arts Book Winner

[Christina · Rating 4 out of 5]

very good for what it is a great YA mystery/thriller kinda like Gone Girl for kids..

[Lisa RV · Rating 2 out of 5]

One word review: odd.

[sarah · Rating 1 out of 5]

Ummm no. Sorry. Try again next time.

[Tim · Rating 4 out of 5]

Deep starts out telling the reader about Birdie, who is an average girl living in a rainy town in Oregon. She wants danger and adventure because one day she wants to be an author. Then we immediately switch to another girl, Morgan, who lives at see with her parents. She hasn't been the same since her sister died in a storm. We go back to Birdie, who is about to go on a year long vacation in the Bahamas. She goes and is really excited. Meanwhile, Morgan has to get papers for her boat, she can only get them illegally because she left her parents on some pier. She did this because her parents had recently become drunks and she could no longer take it. Okay! This is where it gets interesting. Birdie and her parents are waiting for a boat to take them to the island they're visiting for the year. While waiting, they are invited onto the yacht of a handsome Australian, Nicholas. Birdie's dad is suspicious of this man, and for good reason. Birdie's mom leaves to go get a t-shirt, and Nicholas kidnaps Birdie. She is traveling all over the Caribbean (or so we can assume) and along the way, we realize that Nicholas is not an Australian nor is he anything he portrayed before he kidnapped Birdie. He keeps Birdie on this boat for days before arriving to Nicholas' private island, who he says he inherited from his grandfather. Cut to Morgan, who is sailing in the Caribbean looking for a man named "Tricky Nicky" (I wonder who that could be). Tricky Nicky is the one who will forge illegal documents for Morgan. Back to Birdie, who is sitting on this island, receiving occasional outbursts of anger from Nicholas, while also receiving this loving-like emotion from Nicholas. She is learning all sorts of things about Nicholas, mostly bad, but she plays along pretending to be his "princess" to avoid the angry side of him. Morgan arrives on the island and Nicholas tries to woo her. Morgan doesn't like this and leaves. Birdie in the mean time figures out a way to send a distress call via e-mail. Eventually, the police come to Nicholas' island, but knowing this, Nicholas locks Birdie up in a cage (it's like a box, but come on. Bird? Cage? I couldn't pass it up). Everything is pitch black to Birdie, but there is a window. Birdie sees a shadow moving about, and who else could it be but Morgan? Morgan is caught by Nicholas and locked up inside of the cage with Birdie. While trying to evade the cops, Morgan and Birdie are thrown inside of a hole and left there, presumably to die. While in the cage, in the hole, the two girls bond. Eventually, the police find Birdie and Morgan, Nicholas is caught, and everything works out.
This book was pretty good. I would say it is a suspenseful, action-y book. At times, it felt like a chick-flick, being as the two main characters were girls and it often spoke about "girly" topics. However, I enjoyed it and I think anyone looking for an easy book to read with good action and a good ending should read this. If I remember correctly, there are some adult themes, but I'd rate it at about a PG-13 TV-14 level. I found Morgan to be more enjoyable as Birdie because Birdie is this tween and Morgan is older and more mature. The plot was enjoyable and the main villain, Nicholas, was interesting enough that I had to keep reading to figure out how his story ended. The one thing that I like/don't like about this book is that it is a bit short. I feel like there should have been more. For instance, what happened to the parents when Birdie was kidnapped? How did they feel? We don't really know. Also, they never tell us what happened to Nicholas, though we can assume that he is in prison. There are questions left unanswered. If you like stories that have two points of view, I'd recommend this book.

[Al · Rating 3 out of 5]

Deep by Susanna Vance (2005)

[Kristen · Rating 2 out of 5]

So unmemborable that I checked it out from the media center again because I didn't read it the first time.

[Dani · Rating 4 out of 5]

It's really good and dramatic!

[Amy · Rating 4 out of 5]

I Wasn't sure about this book in the beginning but then the action starts and the set up makes sense. Loved it in the end.

[MOLLY CALDEN]

it was really good it is kind of boring in the beging but just keep reading

[Irene]

Disappointed