Forgive My Fins, by Tera Lynn Childs

After reading The Tail of Emily Windsnap (read my review for that here) I have been craving more mermaid stories.  Perhaps my lifelong love of swimming is what draws me to this concept the most, but all the other elements are what keep me interested.  Forgive My Fins is a bit more grown-up than Emily Windsnap and it provides for a different kind of read.  Half-human, half-mermaid Lily Sanderson spends most of this story torn between her two lives and, initially, I didn't like that about this book.  I wanted it to be all mermaid, all the time, but as the story developed and took shape, I began to enjoy the parallels and the contrast between these two worlds.  I definitely liked this book more than The Tail of Emily Windsnap, because it had better writing, it was longer (and that resulted in more development from each character for each of their personalities to shine through) and it was intended for an older audience which allowed for the added element of romance (and most writers and movie-producers seem to know love can be layered in to almost any story to add depth).  I loved that Tera Lynn Childs took the time to explain a lot of things and create a more plausible mermaid world and I would recommend Forgive My Fins to anyone who likes YA, mermaids, swimming, paranormal or love stories.

Favorite things:  the underwater world, the descriptions of swimming, glistening fins and gorgeous eye colors, the writing (save for the very beginning) that kept me engaged (after the full story finally started to develop), one of the guys in this book (who is wonderful in so many ways and most girls would like to date a guy like him and most guys would like to be a guy like him) and the main character Lily who battles issues of self-esteem, her own morals, questions of love and hate and ends up growing a lot in this book.

Criticisms:  it took a little while to get going and it bored me so much I switched to another book for awhile, a couple of the supporting characters are generic enough to actually confuse them while reading and the sequel seemed to be set up in a single sentence (I really prefer a little more foreshadowing instead of having it come out of no where like it seemed to in Forgive My Fins). 

Overall:  5 out of 5 stars...  thankfully the weak beginning was only 38 pages, so I am still giving it 5 stars, however I was considering giving it 4 stars so there is no exclamation mark (lol) and I wanted to clarify a little more as well.

Ttyl everyone and I hope this week is a great week for all!  :)