Dark Tide by Jennifer Donnelly
Series: The Waterfire Saga
Published October 13th 2015 by Disney-Hyperion
Genre: fantasy, young adult, paranormal, mythology, mermaids
links: Goodreads | Amazon | Book Depository
rating: ★★★★
summary:
Once a lost and confused princess, Serafina is now a confident leader of the Black Fin Resistance (BFR). While she works on sabotaging her enemy and enlisting allies for battle, her friends face challenges of their own. Ling is in the hold of Rafe Mfeme’s giant trawler, on her way to a prison camp. Becca meets up with Astrid and learns why the Ondalinian mermaid is always so angry: she is hiding a shameful secret. Ava can’t return home, because death riders await her arrival. And it is getting more and more difficult for Mahdi, Serafina’s betrothed, to keep up the ruse that he is in love with Lucia Volerno. If Lucia’s parents become suspicious, his life–and all of Sera’s hopes–will be extinguished. Political intrigue, dangerous liaisons, and spine-tingling suspense swirl like a maelstrom in this penultimate book in the WaterFire saga
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Unlike in Rogue Wave where the focus was on Serafina and Neela, Astrid, Becca and Ling has the most book time in Dark Tide. They are all facing internal conflicts and are having a hard time but they’re pushing forward because they believe in a better future and all of them are fighting for more than just themselves.
It was really fun seeing them split up and do their own things with their own abilities. Since we are following all of them, we explored so many different places under the sea. Other than Neela and Sera, the rest are on the hunt for their respective tailsman. What made me like this book was that it felt like when Harry, Hermonie and Ron are searching for horcruxes. It was thrilling and nerve-wrecking.
Dark Tide is super fast-paced, even quicker than the first two books. Everything is sped up 1000 times, so the time jumps was distracting and incomprehensible. Now that the book follows multiple perspectives, I find myself getting whiplashed by the speed things are happening.
Astrid was an underwhelming character even since the first book, we don’t know much of her other than that she was hostile and unfriendly towards the other mermaids. Sera’s and Astrid’s kingdom had been swarmed with tension for a long time. Astrid’s father was suspected of organising the assassination of Sera’s parents. However, now we know why Astrid was always so bitter and I’m seeing her in a different light.
I’m not a big fan of relationships that have no build up and that’s precisely what happened. Actually, there’s a relationship that blossomed that I’m okay with, but the other one was too fast and without preamble except that the guy had really pretty eyes.
Neela and Ava felt non-existent. There was barely any parts with their perspectives which I’m a little sad about. I really liked Neela’s POV and there’s not much we know about Ava.
Overall, I enjoyed reading the third instalment of the series. Serafina definitely grew on me after the first book and I loved seeing her step up to be the princess she is. The girls were so independent and understanding; only Astrid didn’t believe but the rest of the girls went all out doing what they can to rescue the world from Abbadon.
That’s all for the review!
my aesthetic for dark tide
“Lots of things are impossible,” she said softly. “Until they’re not.”
