The Mermaid's Mirror Guest Review

In honor of Mermaid Week we have a guest reviewer today. She reviewed The Mermaid's Mirror for me, so here it is I hope you all love it.

Hello, it's mummazappa here from The Book Nerd Club and I'm thrilled to be guest posting today for Mermaid Week! Thanks Caitlin for inviting me. Here is my review of The Mermaid's Mirror by LK Madigan.

Rating: 4/5 Stars - I liked it

From the back cover:

Lena has lived her whole life near the beach - walking for miles up and down the shore and breathing the salty air, swimming in the cold water and watching the surfers rule the waves. The problem is she's spent her whole life just watching. As her sixteenth birthday approaches, Lena vows she will no longer just watch from the sand: she will learn to surf even though her father forbids it. Because something keeps drawing Lena to the water....an ancient powerful magic. And one day Lena catches sight of this magic: a beautiful woman with a silvery tail. Now nothing can stop Lena searching for the mermaid, not even the dangerous waves at Magic Crescent Cove. And soon...what she sees in the mermaid's mirror will change her life forever.

Review:

Apart from a 13 month period in Japan, I have lived my entire life on the coast, I grew up going to the beach for swims in the summer, and as a teenager hanging out there even in the winter with my friends. The sea is such a part of my life I desperately miss it when I am away. As I was reading this book I thought to myself that this author really knows the coast and the ocean, I could visualise her descriptions so clearly and could feel the sand between my toes, hear the gulls and smell the salt. When I finished the book I read the author's notes at the end - LK Madigan says this book is her 'love letter to the sea' - and it's a good one! So I had an automatic connection to the story.

What is great about this story is the character development - each character is so clearly drawn that they jump right off the page into real life and would be easily recognisable if you saw them walking down the street. The first part of the book is well developed so the reader gets a clear picture of Lena's life - where she lives, her family, her friends and her boyfriend. The second part of the book is not quite so well developed. It has a surreal, dream-like tone, which is appropriate for the setting and events, but for me lacked some of the punch of the first part of the book. I'm not going to say too much more about this, as I don't want to give away any spoilers - I enjoyed having the mystery unfold piece by piece and I don't want to spoil that for anyone else reading it! I'll just say that I'm hoping there is a second book coming out as I would really (really, really, really) like to know more about that part of Lena's story.

So overall, this is an interesting read which I was able to dive into and get lost in. There is a good amount of mystery revealed a little bit at a time, with a great lead character and supporting characters. It has peaked my interest in mythical mermaids and I'll be keeping my eyes out for more stories about them. I'm also really looking forward to any further books about Lena - I just hope I don't have to wait too long to find out more of her story.