Secrets We Tell the Sea by Martha Riva Palacio Obón (review)

Reviewed by: Secrets We Tell the Sea by Martha Riva Palacio Obón Amanda Toledo Obón, Martha Riva Palacio Secrets We Tell the Sea; illus. by Dana San Mar; tr. from the Spanish by Lourdes Heuer. Bloomsbury, 2023 [256p] Trade ed. ISBN 9781547608164 $17.99 E-book ed. ISBN 9781547608171 $12.59 Reviewed from digital galleys R Gr. 5-7 In science class, ten-year-old Sofía sees a picture of a fetus in utero and assumes that everyone must be some kind of fish if they all start out in fluid, so she decides she is a mermaid. Issues with her mom's boyfriend—Sofía can tell he's a barracuda by the way he looks at her—result in Sofía being sent to ocean-side Bahía to stay with her grandmother Tita. In Bahía, Sofía befriends Luisa, a girl with vitiligo whom she recognizes as a fellow mermaid; the two friends find comfort and kinship in each other, until Luisa accidentally drowns as they play in the ocean. The author weaves a rich magical realism story that reads with the simplicity and heart of a fable, taking the complexity of humanity and making it tangible. Sofía's devastation coinciding with typhoons and hurricanes around town brings in a layer of ambiguous fantasy, but the narrative is anchored in a tragic reality, especially in the occasional adult perspective, such as Luisa's bereaved mother angrily telling Sofía that her mom's real job is a stripper at a bar, rather than the trapeze artist Sofía has always assumed. If the ending reads a little too magical, with a parent finally seeing the light about an abusive romantic partner and immediately working to rectify it, that might be as much a needed and treasured fantasy for some readers as glowing seashells, sea dragons, and mermaids. Copyright © 2023 The Board of Trustees of the University of Illinois