OCEAN DEPTHS

This third installment of a YA series finds a teenager trapped in the past after reuniting with her love.

With the help of her Grandma Anne and a magic spell, 18-year-old Callista Ann Pacii has traveled several centuries into the past. She’s on Nanwe, an island that will someday be discovered by the HMS Bounty and renamed Pitcairn. Escaping a present where her connection to Lord Triton isn’t certain, Callista has luckily reunited with a younger version of her merman. Yet King Poseidon’s son—who’s been cast from the royal family because of his love for Nehalennia, his brother’s betrothed—still answers to his mother, Queen Amphitrite. The queen and Triton’s Aunt Tethys summon him to ensure that he love Callista the best he can and not worry about his future. But Callista is determined to escape the boredom, privation, and natives of Nanwe and go back to her own time. After several attempts at the return spell fail, she allows Triton to comfort her with fabulous meals and magical fashion creations. Eventually, the two sail from Nanwe on a majestic Carrack destined for Australia. Though life with Triton is adventurous and often ideal, Callista still faces challenges like Isabel, the lord’s former “coupling assignment”; Myraena, a vengeful serpentine goddess; and a savagely instigated, if potentially joyous, life event. In this volume, Sherman (Ocean Depths: A Time, 2017, etc.) offers her protagonists paradise before hurling them into dire straits. Triton, as always, skirts the line between chivalrous and creepy when he says: “This is exactly what I want to do, watching you sleep, listening in on your dreams and thinking about us.” Interludes leave the lovers behind to visit the present, where Grandma Anne and Callista’s friend Jazz are the only people who remember the time-traveling protagonist thanks to another spell. Nehalennia, the lost mermaid whose beauty launched the series’ drama, threatens to become entwined with Callista in an astounding manner. The author leaves readers with a sinister cliffhanger sure to generate gasps. Vibrant color paintings by Sherman enliven the journey throughout.

An engaging tale that merges fantasy drama and leisurely romance.