How was I supposed to differentiate between the pain due to the concussion and the pain due to the agony of everyday human life?" What feels unique about Chlorine is that it’s told not in the present, but from the future, by a mermaid Ren who has already shed her “pain… from remaining human.” Song writes in a prosaic style that is blunt and confessional while still strikingly detached. It’s clear from the outset that Ren is not speaking from the familiar perspective of an outsider Asian teen, but also as an immortally higher being. “Nearly every human memory is corrupted by the fact that it is a memory of being human,” she tells us in a contemptuous aside, refuting cultural assumptions of the mermaid as powerless, or ashamed of their physiological difference. GO GO GO JIAO YOU JIAO YOU JIAO YOU ADD OIL ADD OIL ADD OIL" this is not a complaint i actually think it's very funny the translation is included bc no other pinyin (afaict) is translated throughout. spread that culture. EDIT: my friend pointed out to my extremely sleep-deprived brain that the correct pinyin is "JIA YOU" (from the other available pinyin, the text does seem to use standard mandarin) and at first i thought i'd made a typo but actually it says "JIAO YOU" in the text. so actually now i do have a problem which is echoing my earlier point Who At HarperCollins Copyedited This The “sapphic romance” mainly consists of the main character stringing along her best friend for no reason, only reaching out for a deeper connection with that best friend in moments of need. For example, she blows her off to have unprotected sex with this guy and only hits up her friend when she wants someone to come with her to get a pregnancy test. Later in the book, she ghosts this friend for a while and the friend is blamed for something awful that happens to the main character with another guy. The friend is then left wondering what she did to the main character.

Ren’s delusion that she is a mermaid might(?) be because of her concussion, and her brain damage progressively getting worse because she didn’t treat it correctly, but it’s never fleshed out. When Ren first gets the concussion, she sees a mermaid tail in the stars. She also sees everyone in the hospital as fish people. This never comes up again. Several years later, she has a mental break where she thinks she’s a mermaid, but it’s not portrayed as the concussion caused some sort of damage that progressively got worse. All the concussion does is give her chronic headaches. So why was she hallucinating fish people in the hospital? What was the point of that? or even better, when the narrator is supposed to be SEVEN YEARS OLD, she tells her mom: “Swimming can be my extracurricular activity on my college applications. The coach said I showed raw talent.”

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Inspired by David Copperfield, Kingsolver crafts a 21st-century coming-of-age story set in America’s hard-pressed rural South. While an accurate cover text for a book is a success for the writer of that description and undoubtedly fulfills its purpose, I have to admit that a cover description which is accurate to a fault gives away pretty much all the book is about, that can dampen the final opinion even though all expectations are met, but there has been nothing more than what the description gives. That is the case for me with Jade Song's Chlorine. In the vein of The Piscesand The Vegetarian, Chlorineis a debut novel that blurs the line between a literary coming-of-age narrative and a dark unsettling horror tale, told from an adult perspective on the trials and tribulations of growing up in a society that puts pressure on young women and their bodies… a powerful, relevant novel of immigration, sapphic longing, and fierce, defiant becoming. But these are human concerns. These are the concerns of those confined to land, those with legs. Ren grew up on stories of creatures of the deep, of the oceans and the rivers. Ones that called sailors to their doom. Ones that dragged them down and drowned them. Ones that feasted on their flesh. Ones of the creature that she's always longed to become: mermaid. While Chlorine is an ode to the various mermaids Ren saw herself in, my personal interpretation of the mermaids were as a symbol of perfection, but also as a symbol of breaking free. Perfection because as long as Ren was human, and swam in chlorine infested waters she could never reach her true ‘goal’. But as a mermaid she could achieve so much and more.

The other characters that became a fundamental part of Ren’s transformation and growth are written with equal care. Song’s intent to push Ren through the side characters was so deliberate and precise. There are goosebumps all over as I see the shift in Ren’s conscience and demeanour taking effect. One of the side characters that is a tool in helping Ren is her best friend, Cathy. Their relationship is one of the highlights of the story for me. I love how Song weaved in a sapphic plot line through Cathy. She has been loyal to Ren ever since they were young and she continued to be so up until the end. In a way Cathy enabled Ren’s fantasy to become a reality as a result of her infatuation and loyalty. Cathy’s longing for Ren’s affection is intense and palpable that the tension is so high, as a reader I could feel it through my bones. This fantastically strange, explosive debut novel entrances even as it unsettles. It’s so brilliantly written’ This book was viscerally unnerving and I could not put it down‘– Sarah Gailey, author of THE ECHO WIFE heavy expectations from parents, teachers, peers, fitting in, body issues, the right clothes, beautifications, a tender story of a lonely outcast girl who just wanted to transcend into a body which reveled in power not pain.” — The Fantasy Hivei cannot stand being talked down to as a reader, especially for themes as simple as "bigotry abounds." I think I would transcend into the mermaid with rainbow armor. Or maybe I’d be a goth cyborg mermaid . Or maybe I’d be one of the cute mermaids illustrated on this valentine my friend sent me, which said “we ‘mer-maid’ to be friends”—basically, I change my mind all the time, which is part of the fun and freedom of queer transcendence. I guess I’d be the kind of mermaid who transcends into whoever they want to be on each different day. The inserter girl gets blood on her hands. The insertee girl tells her to wash it off. The inserter girl doesn’t wash it off.

Ren, being an immigrant’s daughter with a father that lives in a different continent, is shaped to become the person everyone influential in her life expected her to be. Though Ren herself doesn’t know who she wants to become; her identity is put on the shelf multiple times as she is put under enormous pressure. Song writes Ren’s story with masterful skill pushing Ren slowly to the edge with incredibly engaging prose. The slow ascent to unhinged madness as Ren is whipped to reality by the disappointments of her coach, peers, and family; pushes her to embrace the identity formed by her delusions.An aching siren song, one that points us towards those uncharted dimensions of desire and identity that swim and shimmer, in and out of being." if i am being fully honest—and to the eternal chagrin of myself, my loved ones, and the world around me, i usually am—this was annoying and boring. in our main character, in the frustrating writing, and in how obvious and repetitive all the themes are. Ren Yu is a swimmer. Her daily life starts and ends with the pool. Her teammates are her only friends. Her coach, her guiding light. If she swims well enough, she will be scouted, get a scholarship, go to a good school. Her parents will love her. Her coach will be kind to her. She will have a good life. Fierce... so vivi d... both b eautif ul and frightening. Chlorine isn’t just a coming of age story. It’s the tale of transformation from human to something wilder and more transcendent. It’s about lov e and longing and the willingness to do anything to become who you truly are."

In Song’s disturbing and visionary debut, a child pushed too hard to succeed becomes a monster of her own making… The body horror is striking, as is Song’s prose, in which she riffs on the various ways the team members are “mutilated” (“We mutilated our beauty, though this sense of beauty was an outdated version defined by narrow wrists and bird bones”). It’s a singular coming-of-age.” — Publishers WeeklyMajor themes which Song explores are identity, peer pressure and how culture plays a significant part. For example Ren idolises Faye Wong, her and her mother’s favourite Hong Kong musician and actress, yet her swim team friends like Bon Jovi and Journey, therefore Ren’s passions are lost on them. In the midst of hormones and trying to fit in, Ren’s life is filled with a lot of toxic damaging experiences. Yet there is some light, in the form of a red haired girl called Cathy. Their blossoming friendship and their sapphic longing is raw and turbulent, but holds such sweet moments. Though even Cathy cannot hold the darkness at bay and as the pressures rise from her swimming coach and from her mother, when she cannot meet their expectations and ultimately begins to fail, we see the toll it takes on Ren’s mental health. The way Ren copes with life, the way she’s always coped really, is to only visualise succeeding in her studies and swimming meets as ‘human’ tasks which will eventually fulfil her goal to becoming a true body of the water.