Ocean’s Gift Review Tour
By Demelza Carlton
January 31 – February 19
Book Promotions by Literary Nook
My Review
I like how the story is told from several points of view, particularly Sirena’s and Joe’s. I’m a huge fan of character driven stories and the author immediately hooked me with her well written thoughts and dialogue with the two main ones, Joe and Vanessa (Sirena). I got to know them well and the glimpses into their thoughts helped me make a connection, get to know their ins and outs and why they acted the way the did.
I was provided with necessary background and a history of the sirens, which I enjoyed. Sirens are often presented as water nymphs, tempting with their songs and then killing hapless sailors and fishermen. It’s nice to see them portrayed as having human qualities, a heart, as such.
Joe’s a reluctant lobster fisherman and Vanessa, well, she’s a siren. And she’s on a mission. All of the sirens are. Something is wrong in their home under the waves. With the ocean. And the sirens have split off into groups, posing as humans to gather information. Information important for their survival and the ocean. But what they are must not be discovered.
Of course, Joe and Vanessa meet and their attraction ignites. They share a liking for beer and each others body parts.
While there are sex scenes, they are light and more in fun than graphic.
Joe is sexy in his down-under humor and laid back way of living. A hard worker and intelligent, he’s also lacking. Lacking in the love department. He may think he likes a casual, love em and leave em relationship, but that may go by the wayside after he encounters Vanessa (Serina).
Vanessa, on the other hand, is a siren, and as such, she’s beautiful, a temptress to look at, and knows how to use her wiles. She may live most of her life under the ocean, missing out on the advances of technology taking place on land, but she’s a quick study, naturally curious, and finds herself liking a lot of human things, such as ice cream, beer, and Joe.
It was easy to switch from Joe’s perspective to Vanessa’s. The author did an excellent job giving Joe his voice. He felt all male and I wondered if she’d interviewed a few to get that psyche down so well.
The world the author built was captivating and rich, from how the siren’s switched to human form, to their intricate language, and to the ocean’s peril, which would affect all life on the planet. An environmental message is delivered in a fascinating, humorous romance.
Down under snark, an impossible romance, and our ocean’s deep mysteries. All comes together for a romping, intriguing story that keeps you laughing and thinking. I’m curious what comes next in this series.
5 Stars
****
The official book trailer:
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-lsooykXUdI]
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Enjoy this glimpse inside Ocean’s Gift
The ocean gave him to me.
I was angry, as any girl of sixteen would be. I’d been ordered by my elders to go and find a strong man, one I could join with to produce a healthy child. My hopes, my dreams and my plans were of no consequence. My destiny was to entice a man to choose me as his plaything – to be a piece of flesh to bait a shark. Or to be a baby seal, tempting a killer whale? The example did not matter. The end would be the same – the end of my control over what had been my life.
I swam in the storm, revelling in the power of the waves, which pushed a little wooden sailing boat through the maelstrom on the surface over my head. Two men struggled to control the small craft with two wooden oars, the vessel’s only means of propulsion once the sail was torn away in the wind. One man dived from the boat, slicing into the water like a knife surrounded by bubbles. There was a line of twisted fibre in his hand as he swam with difficulty for shore.
The little boat rocked in reaction to the diver’s spring. The wind caught the remnants of the sail, a big wave washed over the side and the vessel tipped under the surface, sinking slowly. I dodged through the debris as it drifted in the current away from the little boat.
The surface above me churned where the second man had been thrown into the water. He thrashed around and it was clear he could not swim. The waves pushed us together and he clung to me, his arms warm as he wrapped them around me. I gave him my breath and took him to the surface. As we drifted between the waves, still he would not let me go.
He called me his Lady of the Sea, his angel. I gave him my breath again, before I dove under the waves with him.
We surfaced near a small island of sand, washed by the waves. Here he would be safe.
He shivered, in wet clothes on wet sand. He called me Santa Maria, his Lady of the Sea who had answered his prayer.
If I was to save him, I had to keep him warm. Yet I had no human accoutrements, nothing warm or dry with which to assist him. Only me.
I concentrated on my form, letting my tail part, my skin pale and my gills fade. To save this man, I needed to be human.
Or as close as I could be.
He kissed and clung to the naked human girl by his side, who could think of only one way to warm him. He kissed my lips and my blood responded with a wave of heat, akin in power to the waves of the storm on my body.
We warmed one another, as the storm and the waves raged around us. He clung to me even when exhaustion claimed us.
When I awoke, the storm had dissipated. I could return this man to his people and he would live.
Whilst he still slept, I carried him through the water to the island where his kind lived. Yet in the deep water there were sharks, attracted by the man’s blood.
Mine.
Leaving him floating on the surface, I charged the sharks, shouting my claim to drive them off. It came to blows to drive the last one away, before I could return for my human.
Yet he was not on the surface when I returned. The water in his clothing had dragged him down, into the deep where he could not breathe. I gave him my breath, over and over, in a poor, cold imitation of his ardent kisses, yet I could breathe no life into his body.
The ocean gave me this man, his life to save, then stole his breath even as I tried to save him. The man who called me an angel, Maria, as he loved me for a storm.
I cursed the islands, for they were cursed already. I would not go ashore on these wretched rocks, to conceive a child to take back to my sisters in the deep. No child conceived in such bitterness would survive inside me to be birthed at the Nursery Grounds. So I resolved to tell my elders, when I returned to them.
I cannot carry a child for you. Even the ocean is against it.
In a sea of rebelliousness, the girl he called Maria was lost, as I turned tail and dove deep.
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Character profile of Joe Fisher:
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C-KYZr6yY6g]
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The book description:
Sirens don’t fall in love with humans. For centuries it has been so…
But Sirena is different. She lost her first love to sharks and a storm, cursing the islands that stole him from her.
Times have changed and she must swim ashore once more, to the islands she once cursed.
Gone are the boats powered by sail and steam – jet boats with GPS are now the order of the day.
Enter Joe, the deckhand on the Dolphin. A handy man to have around when the lights go out. He’ll fix your generator and have the lights back on in no time, no worries.
But can he seduce a siren?
Or will she swim away before he can uncover her secret?
A book about lobsters, beer and boobs, on some cursed islands off the coast of Western Australia. At least, that’s how Joe tells it.
For Sirena, it’s a very different story.
A tiny taste of what’s in store:
The boat was almost full of water now, I realised in panic, as I groped for a bucket to start bailing. Throwing bucket after bucket overboard, I couldn’t tell if I was making any difference to the water level in the boat.
One moment I was holding the bucket, about to scoop up more water, the next I was flying through the air. Immersed in cold, black water, I couldn’t see the surface. I struggled, kicking in the direction I thought was up, and hit a rock. I jerked back reflexively and my head cleared the water. I gulped a huge lungful of air and grabbed for the rock. I had to hold on ’til daylight.
Another big wave broke. I tried to keep hold of the slimy rock, but I was pushed out of reach, drifting in the current. I tried to kick my legs, but I wasn’t sure if I did. I couldn’t feel my feet and the numbness was creeping up my legs.
I could hear the breakers on the outer reef, louder than they were from shore. I could feel the spray on my face. A wave washed over me and I was under the water again.
I thought I could feel someone beside me, rolling me over so my face was at the surface, pulling my body through the water.
All I could hear was an unearthly singing, high and sad, like some kind of suicidal dolphin. I could say I blacked out, but everything was already so black I wouldn’t have noticed the difference.
I checked out of Hotel Consciousness. At least I got to dream of Vanessa naked.
****
Ocean’s Gift series
This is the first book in Demelza Carlton’s Ocean’s Gift series, which currently includes:
Ocena’s Gift )Book 1)
Ocean’s Infiltrator (Book 2)
Water and Fire (Book 3)
You’ll never look at mermaids the same way again.
Author biography:
Demelza Carlton has always loved the ocean, but on her first snorkelling trip she found she was afraid of fish.
She has since swum with sea lions, sharks and sea cucumbers and stood on spray-drenched cliffs over a seething sea as a seven-metre cyclonic swell surged in, shattering a shipwreck below.
Sensationalist spin? No – Demelza tends to take a camera with her so she can capture and share the moment later; shipwrecks, sharks and all.
Demelza now lives in Perth, Western Australia, the shark attack capital of the world.
The Ocean’s Gift series was her first foray into fiction, followed by the Nightmares trilogy.
Purchase links:
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Contact links:
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Angela Scott hears voices. Tiny fictional people sit on her shoulders and whisper their stories in her ear. Instead of medicating herself, she decided to pick up a pen, write down everything those voices tell me, and turn it into a book. She’s not crazy. She’s an author. For the most part, she writes contemporary Young Adult novels. However, through a writing exercise that spiraled out of control, she found herself writing about zombies terrorizing the Wild Wild West–and loving it. Her zombies don’t sparkle, and they definitely don’t cuddle. At least, she wouldn’t suggest it. She lives on the benches of the beautiful Wasatch Mountains with two lovely children, one teenager, and a very patient husband. She graduated from Utah State University with a B.A. degree in English, not because of her love for the written word, but because it was the only major that didn’t require math. She can’t spell, and grammar is her arch nemesis. But they gave her the degree, and there are no take backs.
