Review: Lies Beneath by Anne Greenwood Brown

Title: Lies Beneath
Author: Anne Greenwood Brown
Series: Lies Beneath
Book #: 1
Pages: 303
Reading Level: YA
Book Rating: 
Goodreads Rating: 3.74
Published: June 12th, 2012

Calder White lives in the cold, clear waters of Lake Superior, the only brother in a family of murderous mermaids. To survive, Calder and his sisters prey on humans, killing them to absorb their energy. But this summer the underwater clan targets Jason Hancock out of pure revenge.

They blame Hancock for their mother's death and have been waiting a long time for him to return to his family's homestead on the lake. Hancock has a fear of water, so to lure him in, Calder sets out to seduce Hancock's daughter, Lily. Easy enough—especially as Calder has lots of practise using his irresistible good looks and charm on unsuspecting girls. Only this time Calder screws everything up: he falls for Lily—just as Lily starts to suspect that there's more to the monsters-in-the-lake legends than she ever imagined. And just as his sisters are losing patience with him.

Taschima's POV:


Lies Beneath was, for me, a roller coaster of emotions. At one point I was having all sorts of doubts about it, and the next thing I know I was glued to the page.

When I first started reading Lies Beneath me I have to admit it took me a little to get into the novel. The beginning was slow to kick off and it didn't really take a hold of me. Mermaids in this book are killers, they feed off the emotions of humans. THIS IS THE COOL PART; they are not your garden variety mermaids. Now, having said that, it was hard for me at the beginning to like the main character. He was ... kind of creepy and hard to like. He self contained from "feeding" not because he thought it was wrong for him to kill people but because for him it was a sort of game. I wanted to smack him. Some of the things he did, and thought about, were revolting. Though I could also understand because you know he was raised as a freaking mermaid, and mermaids are natural killers. I got the memo half way through the novel. I was able to forgive, but I'll never forget the hilarious/terrifying image of Cal hiding in the bushes listening in to the girl's sleep over party. Yeah, amigo, that is a no no in human society. He manages to redeem himself, barely by the end, but I still wouldn't bring him over to meet the folks. I'm telling you, a love/hate relationship.

On the other hand I liked the girl he is supposed to be stalking and getting to know. Her name is Lily. She is artsy and a poet at heart. Not only that but she is ballsy and has a "don't screw with me" attitude, she doesn't take any BS. AND she confronted Cal about being stalky and creepy! That's my favourite part. She was all like, "dude, why are you stalking me?!" and I wanted to get into the book and give her a high five. You go girl. By the end though her whole character seemed to make a 360 and she got all complacent and dramatic. Lily, I still have hope for you girl.

One of my big problems with this novel was the 1 POV. I would have liked it if I was able to get inside Lily's head and see things from her perspective. Some decisions she took, and some realities she took in strive, left me wanting more from her. I wanted to see things through her eyes, instead of only Cal's.

The whole mermaid myth was pretty cool to read about. I can tell the author really took her time creating the world of the mermaids, at least the world of the mermaids (Can and his sisters) we read about. We don't know much about mermaid society, but we get to learn a lot about them as a species. I wouldn't like them as friends, and that is a good thing cause I am pretty sure if they met me they would just like me as a tasty emotion meal. They are terrifying and alluring, just as any good predator should be, and they are sort of electric? Blame it on the DNA.

Lies Beneath was a combination of the creepy with exhilarating. Reading about these mermaids is totally worth it, even if it took me a while to get into it at first. It is difficult to get over the whole mermaid nature in Cal, I don't know if I am ever going to be over it, but at the end of the day he turned out to be a guy I could understand if not love.

Lies Beneath has a sequel, which I thought was a bit much since this book could have easily been a stand alone, but I am curious to see what comes next in Cal and Lily's life. Specially since it's written from Lily's POV.