Ratings13
Average rating3.8
Cassandra Leung--a seventeen-year-old trainer of Reckoners, sea beasts bred to defend ships--is kidnapped by the pirate queen Santa Elena and ordered to train a Reckoner pup to defend Santa Elena's ship.
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2 primary books3 released booksThe Abyss Surrounds Us is a 3-book series with 2 primary works first released in 2016 with contributions by Emily Skrutskie.
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(Full disclosure: I temporarily received an ARC to read, which I didn't have to review, but I wanted to. So.)
This was ALL SORTS OF EPIC. Full review:
Okay. So I was already super intrigued by this one because there isn't a whole lot of genre f/f out there, and also I really like pirates. So you can imagine I was pretty darn pleased when I started reading and very quickly realized this book was going to blow my expectations out of the water (pun sorta intended).
The Abyss Surrounds Us is EPIC. Imagine Pacific Rim, except the monsters are on the protag's side, and also it's super girl-centric. Cas is such a badass, and her dynamic with Swift was fantastic. I loved the futuristic pirate element—which is something I've never read before (and it was awesome)—plus monsters, and emotions, and girls being awesome, and yeah. Basically, you need to read it.
Not to mention that it gave me really early book feels, and I loved the sea monster element way more than I expected—which was kind of like Pokémon, except kaiju-sized—and The Abyss Surrounds Us is so so different from anything I've read before in the best way possible.
So in short, if you're looking for genre f/f (especially f/f that is not of the coming out variety), and you like pirates, and sci-fi, and sea monster battles sounds like something that might be your thing, The Abyss Surrounds Us is so totally for you. And I can't wait to read the sequel.
Diversity note: Cas and the love interest Swift are both lesbians, and Cas is Chinese American.
This book offered so many great and unique ideas and did absolutely nothing interesting with it.