When We Believed in Mermaids is not all that long. It's only about 350 pages, and the audio version is just shy of 12 hours. It has an average 4.5 star rating on Amazon with more than 100k reviews.
I read this one over several days. I was falling in love with one of the characters and wanted to really savor this story. It's so bittersweet and was really satisfying in a way that I'm not sure I can describe in words, but I'm going to give it my best shot.
It is told in dual point of view between the two sisters, Kit and Josie/Mari. It does not have a linear timeline; a good bit of the book are memories, but I wouldn't consider those flashbacks as a separate timeline. As the sisters are reconnecting, they are having to face their pasts and reconcile it with their presents.
Because of this non-linear storytelling, the author has created a story within a story, but she does it so beautifully and in a way that enhances the present timeline.
To avoid spoilers, skip to the end of the post.
***Spoilers**
The book begins with Kit, an ER doctor working in Santa Cruz, California. She's on the overnight shift taking a break watching live coverage of a nightclub fire in Auckland, New Zealand, when in the background of the reporter's shot she sees a woman who looks just like her supposed-to-be-dead sister, Josie. Deciding that she's just seeing ghosts again, Kit decides not to tell her mother about it, but her mother saw the coverage, too, and convinces Kit to go to New Zealand and find this woman. Kit reluctantly agrees.
Turns out, the woman Kit and her mom saw on the news was Josie. Only, she goes by Mari now. She's married, has two kids, and a successful career flipping houses, and has no intention of merging her past life with her current one. But with Kit in the city looking for her, it's only a matter of time.
Meanwhile, Kit has rented an apartment and met Javier, a semi-famous Spanish singer who's in the country to get over the death of a close friend. Kit doesn't do serious or long-term relationships, but she can't seem to resist Javier. The two spend time exploring the city together and looking for Josie. They obviously grow closer, though Kit is determined to keep their relationship to nothing more than a summer fling.
Eventually the two sisters' paths do cross and everything comes to a head. Through the flashbacks woven throughout the book, we learn about what led to Josie faking her death and starting over in New Zealand.
Kit and Josie's mother and father were terrible parents. Their father was a renowned Italian chef who owned a restaurant that sat on a cliff overlooking a cove just outside Santa Cruz. He and their mother had a passionate but violent relationship. They were obsessed with each other and essentially left Kit and Josie to care for themselves. When Dylan showed up on their doorstep one night badly beaten, the family took him in and he became like an older brother to Kit and Josie, filling the role of parental figure, especially to Kit, who he and Josie both manage to protect.
No one is able to protect Josie, though. At age 9, she is sexually abused by one of the restaurant's patrons. This leads to her becoming an alcoholic by the time she's 13. Dylan, an addict himself, introduces her to marijuana during a panic attack which eventually leads to harder drugs. When she's almost 15, Josie gets Dylan incredibly drunk and high and convinces him to take her virginity, resulting in her becoming pregnant. Dylan goes on to commit suicide, and Josie has an abortion.
On the day of Josie's abortion, an earthquake destroys the family restaurant and home, killing their father. This has a great impact on all three women. Josie becomes even wilder, the mother sinks further into her addiction, and Kit is essentially abandoned. Kit goes on to earn her doctorate, while Josie surfs and gets high. Eventually, after Josie steals everything she has, Kit cuts her sister off, and it's not long after that that Josie "dies" in a terrorist attack on a train in France.
When the two sisters reunite in New Zealand, Josie/Mari confesses the sexual abuse, her dysfunctional relationship with Dylan, and the abortion to Kit as well as to her husband. While Kit is horrified that no one protected her sister, she's also overwhelmed and betrayed. After reconnecting her sister and mother through a video call, Kit decides that she has fulfilled her promise and goes back to her safe life in Santa Cruz where she is no longer happy but doesn't know how to move forward either.
Eventually, Kit's mother and sister, who has managed to successfully repair the tear her relationship suffered when her duplicity was unveiled, stage an intervention. Josie/Mari brings her entire family and Javier to Santa Cruz where they convince Kit that she will not be abandoned ever again.
***End Spoilers***
Whew! That was quite a summary, but all the interweaving parts of the story made it a bit more complicated to break down concisely.
I really loved this book. Barbara O'Neal did such a wonderful job with these characters.
I think it would have been so easy to hate Josie/Mari after she abandoned her family with seemingly no thought to their well-beings, but the way she was written with all of her trauma and backstory made her such a dynamic and sympathetic character. I especially liked how even though Josie/Mari was escaping from her old life, she was simultaneously rebuilding it but in the way that she needed her family to be when she was a child.
Kit's character development was much more subtle but also so so good. She was also sympathetic and dynamic but in a way that felt very appropriate for her life experiences. Where Josie suffered so many traumas, Kit was abandoned over and over again, and that abandonment was expressed in literally every pore of her character, and I am so glad that the author gave her Javier, who I absolutely fell in love with. Everyone needs someone who refuses to give up on them
When We Believed in Mermaids was my second book by Barbara O'Neal. I read This Place of Wonder back in 2023. Ironically, it too was about a family whose patriarch was a chef who find their ways back to each other after his death, though I did not piece together that similarity until after I had read this one. Safe to say that Barbara O'Neal has found her place on my favorite authors list, and I can't wait to read more of her work.
It's not too late to join my book club! Up next, The Price of Paradise by Susana Lopez-Rubio. Check out the monthly schedule here.
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