Review of Songs From The Deep by Kelly Powell (digital arc)

 

 

 

Songs From The Deep by Kelly Powell

 

A girl searches for a killer on an island where deadly sirens lurk just beneath the waves in this gripping, atmospheric debut novel.

The sea holds many secrets.

Moira Alexander has always been fascinated by the deadly sirens who lurk along the shores of her island town. Even though their haunting songs can lure anyone to a swift and watery grave, she gets as close to them as she can, playing her violin on the edge of the enchanted sea. When a young boy is found dead on the beach, the islanders assume that he’s one of the sirens’ victims. Moira isn’t so sure.

Certain that someone has framed the boy’s death as a siren attack, Moira convinces her childhood friend, the lighthouse keeper Jude Osric, to help her find the real killer, rekindling their friendship in the process. With townspeople itching to hunt the sirens down, and their own secrets threatening to unravel their fragile new alliance, Moira and Jude must race against time to stop the killer before it’s too late—for humans and sirens alike.

Expected publication: November 5th 2019 by Margaret K. McElderry Books

 

 

 

I’m trying to figure out a way to review this book.  It’s a mystery and slow paced.  I thought the atmosphere was amazing, but I wish there were more parts that had sirens.

 

Moira is a young girl (seventeen).  She is a violinist and lives with her mother that she really doesn’t get along with.  Moira was very close to her father that passed away and she wants to be like him.  He was obsessed with the sirens and protecting them.  Moira often times plays her violin on the cliffs close to the sirens.  She knows how far away she can be and carries iron on her at all times.

 

Jude is two years old than Moira and lives in the lighthouse.  His family has been taking care of it for years.   Jude’s father was best friends with Moira’s dad.  He was also obsessed with Sirens and that may have caused his death.  Jude’s father, mother, and sister were out on a boat when they were killed by sirens.  The bodies washed up on shore days later.

 

Moira and Jude used to be close, but she stopped visiting him after her father died.  The schools only teach children until they are 13, but Moira gives private violin lessons to kids.

 

This island has a siren killing ban in place.  Tourists come there to see the sirens, and many don’t survive.  But it’s rare for a local to be killed by one.  A young boy was found dead by the water.  Jude found him and Moira went down to see who it was.  She noticed that his throat was cleanly slit.  The police come and say that it’s a siren killing.  But Moira knows that the sirens kill in the water and their bites and slices are jagged.  She is determined to find the murderer and gets Jude to help her.

 

A lot of the story is Jude and Moira working together and reconnecting.  Both are keeping secrets from each other.  While trying to solve the murder, we get glimpses back into the past with Moira’s and Jude’s fathers.  There are many on the island that want to hunt sirens again and Moira is afraid that the ban may be lifted because of the twelve year old’s death.

 

As I mentioned above, I really loved the atmosphere in the book.  The setting was great and the sirens were violent, but also not at times.  The pacing was slow, but the mystery and secrets kept me reading.  I was able to read it in two days (slow paced books are usually 4 for me).

 

I gave this book 4 stars.  Thank you to the publisher and netgalley for my review copy.

 

Warnings for graphic death, captivity, and death of a child.

 

Have you read Songs From The Deep?  Is it on your TBR?