Tempest Rising

Tempest has a lot on her plate with her seventeenth birthday coming up; it's not surprising that it comes as a shock to her when her mermaid tendencies come a couple weeks before they were expected to manifest. In fact, it comes as a terrifying revelation that they took up where they had left off six years earlier, where a sea witch was willing to drag Tempest to the sea floor for unknown reasons. For bad purposes are Tempest's guess.

When Kona/Kai is first introduced, it is doubtful you can resist his wash-board abs and mysteriously dark physique. While Tempest may have the perfect life–and no matter how hard she tries to hold on to it–Kai's addition makes for one rocking birthday that knocks Tempest back to the ocean in a confrontation with her dead-set decision she never thought she'd second guess.

Deebs mastered the waves that rolled and crashed in Tempest Rising. The main character, Tempest Maguire, was mindful of her past and she let it bleed into her perception of how she has viewed her mother for the past six years. Her resentment towards her is no secret, and she had long ago made her decision to be nothing like her mother. I believe that she had the right amount of blame for her mother and agreed with how she took it into consideration of all her mermaid-related choices. However, throughout the book, the reader gets a view of the variety of obstacles she endures in order to keep her secret hidden and her decision true. The book initially surpassed my expectations as I read the abrupt twists that were shocking and how fast Tempest was able to acclimate with it all. The plot was rough but original between the relationship of a mermaid and a selkie and their underwater world.

Honestly, I had low expectations when I saw in the synopsis that the author was going to attempt to create an underwater world and I wasn't wrong to have them. I do believe that it could have been perfected and the knowledge behind underwater living could have been made more realistic but to a degree it cushioned the writing style of not going too in-depth of the scenery background and more into the character background. For that I was grateful.

My favorite character, who I just must mention because he had a major impact on the book subtly, was Tempe's father. Talk about the most loving and supporting dad ever. He not only was going through the same emotions that Tempest expressed in terms of her missing mother but he was compassionately supportive when it came to be her time of decision-making.

Overall, I enjoyed reading the struggle and adaptive qualities that made Tempest Rising an addictive debut. You not only want to know more about Tempest's relationships but also about how other characters will fare out in the future.

Grade: B+