Rating: 4 out of 5

Genre: 4 Stars, YA, Sci-Fi / Fantasy 

People who should read this: If you like the ocean, great sister dynamics, and crazy adventures.

I was very confident in my rating for The Vanishing Deep until I discussed the book with my book club. They were a lot more harsh than I was, pulling at the strings that held the story together. I get their points, they’re not entirely wrong, I guess I could just let the problems go for the sake of the story. 

Take Tempe’s boat for example… supposedly it can only hold three people and one more person on board will make it sink. That doesn’t seem very accurate when compared to today’s boats. It also seems weird if you need to think about adding on food, water, or whatever you uncover in the underwater ruins. The book club really hung onto this rule. They didn’t want to let it go. They didn’t want to accept it as the plot device that it was. 

I say all of this, because if you’re someone for the particulars, than this might not be the book for you. 

Scholte lacked the right details when designing her boat, but she made up for that with her world building. When it came to Equinox, she paid close attention to the rules, making her readers really see the details, like the economy and weight restrictions. I loved all of those details. It made the world more realistic. 

Other good things… I want to say them all before I go down the long rabbit hole of issues that are bouncing around in my brain. Bringing back a loved one for 24hrs really sparked a thoughtful conversation. Would you want to come back to life if given the choice? And is telling the people the truth about their deaths important? In a world of so many stories, The Vanishing Deep was really fresh for me. I found the points to be unique enough to keep me interested. The sisterly dynamics were perfect. It was almost like Frozen where the sisters can win the day. Their bond is stronger than anything else. 

Which means that not every story needs a love interest or should have one. 

And so it begins…

First off, nothing about Lor is mentioned in the synopsis, so it was a little bit of a shock to see him appear as a POV in the story. Not bad when you read it, even though I think Elysea might have been a better choice. I can see what Scholte was trying to achieve, I just don’t know if it paid off. What she didn’t need to do is force Lor to be more than a person falling in love with life again. He could have bared witness to the inspiring love of the two sisters. 

The Untied Sea was also something that didn’t need to exist. All it did was make the ending a muddy mess, no pun intended. Instead of wrapping the ending up on the emotional moment, Scholte pushed the story on. Maybe she was hoping for a sequel. It could go that way with how much was left open ended. But taking the ending as far as she did, made my heart flip back and forth.  

Maybe my love for The Vanishing Deep all comes down to the fact that this book is about the ocean and I was always meant to live by the sea. I’m not itching to try Schotle’s other works though. Her writing was just okay. Nothing was there to really invoke the emotions out of me like I would have wanted. I was like here is a moment… now let’s move on. I do see my friend loving one of the ships though. She’s going to scream. 

Happy Reading

Love Kait

Reading Challenge: 88/175