Books
Edith Nesbit

Wet Magic

Wet Magic Edith Nesbit — Four siblings travel to the seashore for a holiday. One of them accidentally summons the sister of a mermaid, captured by a circus; and the four children decide to try and save her… What follows is a fantastic and adventurous ride, full of challenges for the children in the underwater world of the mermaids!

Well, I keep looking for a palette cleanser. Although instead of a bad taste, I want to scrub away reality. And the palette is in fact my anxious, exhausted brain. I keep looking for books that will, like, move me physically from this space to another. Books that will wash everything away.

Edith Nesbit did that for me so much when I was a kid, so I sort of had the idea to return to something reliable rather than try something new? And it sort of worked. I love her witty writing and clever characters. I adore the worlds she builds and her approach to writing about magic and the occasional meta details about stories and fairy tales. I love her ability to craft delightful, utter nonsense.

This one was always my favorite — a story about four children (and a tagalong friend) who rescue a captured mermaid. They are taken to her underwater kingdom and accidentally start a war with other oceanic creatures, which is a lot more delightful and a lot less scary than it sounds. I loved this one when I was a kid because I loved the sea and always secretly hoped I was actually a mermaid and would return home one day, like the well-adjusted super-reader that I was.

Here's the thing: it didn't really hold up to my adult eyes. I still love it, and always will, but I enjoyed it more now from the perspective of: oh wow, she didn't just write tropes — she developed them. She originated them. Instead of feeling the pull of escape the way I did as a kid, I felt appreciation for her craft and for the influence she had on the fantasy genre. Which is not to say it was a bad reading experience, or a disappointment (not at all!), it was simply different and unexpected.
171 printed pages
Copyright owner
Bookwire
Original publication
2021
Publication year
2021

Other versions

Have you already read it? How did you like it?
👍👎
fb2epub
Drag & drop your files (not more than 5 at once)