'The Wicked Deep' by Shea Ernshaw: Book Report #1

First, a cited synopsis of the book. “Two Centuries ago, three sisters were sentenced to death for witchery. Stones were tied to their ankles and they were drowned in the deep waters surrounding the town. Now, for a brief time each summer, the sisters return, stealing the bodies of three troubled girls so that they may seek their revenge, luring boys into Sparrow’s harbor and pulling them under. Like many locals, seventeen-year-old Penny Talbot has accepted the fate of the town. But this year, on the eve of the sisters’ return, a boy named Bo Carter arrives, unaware of the danger he has just stumbled into. Mistrust and lies spread quickly through the salty, rain-soaked streets. The townspeople will turn against one another. Penny and Bo will suspect the other of hiding secrets. And death will come swiftly to those who cannot resist the call of the sisters. But only Penny sees what others cannot. And she will be forced to choose: save Bo or save herself.” - Shea Ernshaw.

What we know so far:

Two-hundred years ago, in the fictional seaside town of Sparrow, Oregon there is a legend based on the public execution of three sisters who were perceived to be witches by the people of the town. These sisters, Marguerite, Aurora, and Hazel were drowned with stones tied to their ankles in the towns’ harbor. These are the antagonists of the story, so far. We’re made aware of this early on in the book, with the legend of the sisters. It is said that every year, starting June 1st, the sisters come back to inflict their revenge on the town that betrayed them, all for being beautiful ladies that the men of the town couldn’t resist. The sisters' souls come back to inhabit the bodies of three unsuspecting young girls, and lure boys into the harbor where they were drowned, to inflict the same fate upon the boys. Until the day that marks the beginning of summer solstice, no one is safe from the sisters' wrath. For the past two-hundred years, the curse has repeated itself. Flash forward to the present, Penny Talbot is the narrator and antagonist/main character of this book. She lives on an island, just off the shore of Sparrow, with her mother. Now something I really admire about this book is the change in point-of-view. For the parts of the story centered around the present and its conflicts, it’s told from the perspective of Penny Talbot. But we’re also given a third-person omniscient point of view in certain parts of the book. Wedged in between some of the chapters is where we find these parts, and it elevates the storytelling of this book to a whole new level. We’re in a position where we’re given information that the main characters of the story aren’t privy to just yet. This is a certain writing style that I might adopt for the creative story I’m going to write, I just think this way of building the plot and story gives some interesting “layers”, it keeps me on the edge of my seat. The main conflict we’re seeing in the story is one that involves the whole town, “swan season” (the sisters last names are Swan) and so far the lives of three boys have been taken. But we also see our main character has her own personal conflict. On the eve of this year’s swan season, Bo Carter comes to town. Bo is the mysterious boy that approaches Penny in search of a job. Almost instantaneously, Penny becomes infatuated with Bo. These two characters definitely have some sort of romantic tension going on between the two of them, and we can assume this based on the context clues we’re given. The conflict comes in when there’s this realization that both of these characters who choose to be around each other, are also choosing to withhold personal information from each other. Penny wants to keep Bo safe but doesn’t want him to leave town so she is constantly battling herself trying to figure out if she should tell Bo that she can see who’s been inhabited by the Swan sisters. Bo, being the outsider, has been very skeptical of the town legend so far, but seems he may be swayed to believe it’s true because his older brother drowned the previous Swan season while making his way down the west coast. I’m very excited to see how this series of events will unfold. I have a theory that Penny has been inhabited by the youngest Swan sister, Hazel. So far, she’s seen two Sparrow girl’s inhabited by Marguerite and Aurora, the two eldest of the Swan sisters. We have yet to see Hazel, and as far as we know, the ability to see the Swan sisters has not been one that Penny has had all the 17 years of her life that she’s lived in Sparrow. In one part of the book, the girl inhabited by Marguerite is making direct eye contact with the girl inhabited by Aurora, she is angry that Aurora was foolish enough to be caught in the act of killing two boys. Also, Penny’s deep infatuation with Bo seemed to start when she was close to the water the night the Swan sisters came back. It also seems that Penny gets very defensive over the history of the Swan sisters. All of these details lead me to believe that Penny may be leading Bo to a tragic fate without even realizing it. So far, I’ve found this book to be a real page turner and find it very easy to get lost in it, I can easily visualize everything that happens. I can’t wait to read more; I want to know what happens next.