Breakwater
by Catherine Jones Payne
YA Fantasy
Paperback & ebook, 240 Pages
May 30th 2017 by Fathom Ink Press
Summary
A red tide is rising.
As the daughter of one of the mer-king’s trusted advisors, seventeen-year-old Jade has great responsibilities. When her fiancé murders a naiad, plunging the underwater city of Thessalonike into uproar, tensions surge between the mer and the naiads. Jade learns too late that the choices she makes ripple further than she'd ever imagined. And as she fights against the tide of anger in a city that lives for scandal, she discovers danger lurking in every canal, imperiling her family and shattering the ocean's fragile peace.
Can the city's divisions be mended before the upwelling of hate rips apart everything Jade loves?
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7 Cool Facts About Mermaids
As you might have guessed, I’m a little bit obsessed right now . . . with mermaids. After all, I’ve spent the last year working on a mermaid book, and I’m going to be spending at least two more years in the world of Breakwater, writing the sequels. And I’m not alone. It seems like mermania is sweeping the country. I’m seeing mermaids absolutely everywhere. I mean, what’s not to love—mermaids are beautiful and fierce and get to live in the ocean with the coolest animals on earth. So today, I want to bring you seven cool facts about mermaids that you might not have known.
- Mermaid stories have been around for three thousand years. They first emerged in Assyria, but cultures all across the world have told stories about them. That’s got to count for something—after all, a lot of the ocean is undiscovered, right?
- We think of the old mermaid stories as terrifying—like how the sirens intentionally shipwrecked sailors—but the earliest stories often involve people or goddesses transforming into mermaids as punishment for some terrible crime. So while it may seem like most mermaid books these days deal with girls who become mermaids, or who spend part of their time on land and part in the sea, that’s actually not a new phenomenon—authors who write that kind of mermaid story are playing with an ancient tradition.
- But that doesn’t mean the ancients didn’t have their fair share of terrifying mermaids. Slavic mermaid tales are ghost stories. In Eastern European traditions, the rusalka are the restless spirits of dead young women who want to take their vengeance on men.
- The city of Thessalonike in Breakwater isn’t named after the city in Greece. It’s named after an old Greek mermaid story about a Macedonian princess named Thessalonike—the sister of Alexander the Great. Legend has it that she transformed into a mermaid and tested sailors with the question, “Is Alexander the king alive?” If anyone told her the truth—that Alexander was dead—she drowned them. So if you’re ever in the Aegean Sea, and a mermaid asks you that question, it’s better to just tell her that Alexander is still king of the world.
- There’s a camp in Florida where you can go learn how to be a mermaid. It’s called Weeki Wachee, and they’ve hosted live mermaid shows for decades.
- And even if a trip to Florida is out of the question, you might be able to find mermaids at your local aquarium. Even in my smallish city of Waco, TX, the zoo boasts two mermaids that can come out for special occasions.
- Or, if just seeing a mermaid isn’t enough, you can teach yourself how to be one with a swimtail and a monofin. Some women even make careers out of being a mermaid at events—especially kids’ birthday parties. (I missed my dream job, am I right?)
Are you experiencing mermania? Need a story set in an underwater merworld? I’ve got you covered. Check out my debut novel Breakwater, available through any major online retailer.
About the Author
Catherine Jones Payne is a Seattle native who loves the written word, international travel, crashing waves, and good coffee. Her earliest memory involves pulling up a rolling chair to her parents’ old DOS computer—while wearing a tiara, naturally—and tapping out a story of kidnapped princesses. By day she’s the managing editor of Quill Pen Editorial and the editor of Splickety Magazine. She lives in Waco, TX with her historian husband, Brendan, and their cats, Mildred and Minerva.
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Do you like stories with mermaids? What did you think of the author's mermaid facts?
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