Thanks to NetGalley and Viking for the opportunity to review the ARC!

This is a solid ⭐️4/5 ⭐️

I've never really been a literary fiction person, but I think that's starting to change! We start the story with Melanctha's family emigrating from Liberia to America and follow her in childhood as she deals with racist bullies. One day on a school field trip, she's pushed into a lake and discovers she can breathe underwater. There she meets Habila, a beautiful but vengeful ocean deity who has motives far beyond what the young Melanctha can conceive.

What I really love about this moment is that it's not the beginning but a continuation of a story that began with Melanctha's absent birth father long ago and will follow her well into adulthood. The use of various timelines and disparate characters all woven together is really impressive, and of course, the utter lack of forgiveness for selfish men is intensely satisfying, even while the status quo remains depressingly patriarchal.

It's a slower read but immersive, and well worth the time.