Review: Shorelines by Ruth Ennis

 

Publication Date: 2026

Publisher: Little Island Books

Blurb: (Goodreads)

When proud mermaid Muireann flees her climate-ravaged ocean in search of hope on land, she confronts human cruelty and body-shaming as she struggles to find her true home and voice. Caught between a dying ocean and a divided world, she must grapple between the sea that made her and the surface that might break her – in this stunning verse novel that reimagines The Little Mermaid.

Muireann is a mermaid – fierce, curious and proud of the body that keeps her warm beneath the waves. But life in the ocean is becoming impossible. The merfolk are at war with the human ramifications of climate change: food is scarce, and her twin sister has been killed in a mass-fishing net. With her mother lost in grief and her world falling apart, Muireann longs to escape to the surface to find some answers. But the human world isn’t the haven she hoped for. It’s colder, crueller – and here, her large body is seen not as strength, but as something to be ashamed of. 

I have read A LOT of Little Mermaid YA retellings, and let me tell you this one right here really did hit different. 

There was so many things I loved about this book. Written by an Irish author, her debut too, this book is up there with one of my favourites of the year. Once of the things that made me love this book was the unique twist the author took with the storyline - the plus size representation and championing of bigger bodies in the mer world then seeing the difference of how they are viewed on land, the Irish names of Muireann's family, the seeking of treasures and the sea witch not being villainized in this story. 

The surface part of the story as we see Muireann reach land and the reader thinks oh now is when the fairytale begins only to be hit with the harsh reality that these human men have no love or kindness to show to someone who is different from them. Reading the scenes of Muireann's treatment at the hands of the humans was heartbreaking. I loved the friendship he had with the other prisoner and the ending was incredibly satisfying yet ultimately melancholy. 

The sister twin bond that ran through the story was another of my favourite things. The intertwining of their emotions, her sister never leaving Muireann's thoughts and how she felt such a heart pull to her sister throughout her days was just so beautiful. 

Ruth Ennis crafted such a beautiful, surreal and transportive story in Shorelines - I will be recommending this to everyone.