Book Review: Tempest Rising

This post has been sitting around unfinished for far too long, and I finally got around to finishing it up. I'm still unsure of the best way to go about reviewing books, so bear with me. I've also decided to post in colorful font, just 'cause.

I rather like the cover, don't you? Especially that beautiful tattoo.

Book: Tempest Rising by Tracy Deebs

Genre: fantasy
(as you can probably tell due to that mermaid tail. Though there are people who believe mermaids exist, so, you know, I guess it's realistic fiction for them)

Rating: B
or a 4 out of 5 stars. However, 4 out of 5 is an 80%, which, depending on the teacher, is typically a B-minus or a C-plus. So...I don't really know what to say.

Synopsis: Tempest Maguire wants nothing more than to surf the killer waves near her California home; continue her steady relationship with her boyfriend, Mark; and take care of her brothers and surfer dad. But Tempest is half mermaid, and as her seventeenth birthday approaches, she will have to decide whether to remain on land or give herself to the ocean like her mother. The pull of the water becomes as insistent as her attraction to Kai, a gorgeous surfer whose uncanny abilities hint at an otherworldly identity as well. And when Tempest does finally give in to the water's temptation and enters a fantastical underwater world, she finds that a larger destiny awaits her-and that the entire ocean's future hangs in the balance.

Good Stuff: First of all, mermaids. Definitely the thing that caught my interest. There's also surfing, which I think looks fun. I've never tried surfing, despite living near enough to the ocean, due to how ridiculously cold the water is where I live. This book has romance--a love triangle, in fact, between Tempest, Mark, and Kai. But the love triangle is intertwined with the ocean-or-land dilemma, so it's unique. I also found a satisfactory amount of foreshadowing, conflict, and suspense. There wasn't a huge plot-changing shocker, but that's not always necessary (though I personally rather like those). I also liked how the author described how some things worked in the ocean, but not using the horrid info-dump technique mistake, but using (telepathic) communication between Tempest and Kai. I don't want to include any spoilers, but Tempest did something very controversial that haunted her for the rest of the book, which I very much enjoyed reading.

Bad Stuff: It seemed a little unrealistic. Unrealistic is the wrong word to use here, because of course it's unrealistic, there are mermaids. (unless mermaids DO exist. a topic to be discussed later, though). But books like Harry Potter, I can imagine them happening. Even though the plot was interesting, it seemed a bit, ah, poorly-executed. Don't get me wrong, I still enjoyed the book, since there were lots of interesting and well-written parts. But it seems like Tempest was living in a planet that was very, very similar to Earth, yet not quite the same. (that doesn't make sense, does it?) And while I liked the foreshadowing, it seemed just a little bit too obvious. The second I read that hint, I totally knew what was coming next, but Tempest didn't seem to realize anything, which seemed, again, unrealistic. Also, I was fine with it, but there was some language. Nothing too horrible, so don't let that stop you from reading this book!

Recommended Readers: I'm never certain what to say here, but I have to go with 12 and up, just because of the mild language. And there's some physical romance, but it's just kissing, so...