Name: Victoria Justice's review of Our Wives Under The Sea by Julia Armfield
Item: Our Wives Under The Sea
Rating: 4.5
Author: Victoria Justice

Julia Armfield

Leah is changed. Months earlier, she left for a routine expedition, only this time her submarine sank to the sea floor. When she finally surfaces and returns home, her wife Miri knows that something is wrong. Barely eating and lost in her thoughts, Leah rotates between rooms in their apartment, running the taps morning and night. As Miri searches for answers, desperate to understand what happened below the water, she must face the possibility that the woman she loves is slipping from her grasp.

By turns elegiac and furious, wry and heartbreaking, "Our Wives Under the Sea" is an exploration of the unknowable depths within each of us, and the love that compels us nevertheless toward one another.

Our Wives Under The Sea

Miri thinks she has got her wife back, when Leah finally returns after a deep sea mission that ended in catastrophe. It soon becomes clear, though, that Leah may have come back wrong. Whatever happened in that vessel, whatever it was they were supposed to be studying before they were stranded on the ocean floor, Leah has carried part of it with her, onto dry land and into their home.

To have the woman she loves back should mean a return to normal life, but Miri can feel Leah slipping from her grasp. Memories of what they had before – the jokes they shared, the films they watched, all the small things that made Leah hers – only remind Miri of what she stands to lose. Living in the same space but suddenly separate, Miri comes to realize that the life that they had might be gone.

"Our Wives Under The Sea" is the debut novel from the critically acclaimed author of "salt slow". It’s a story of falling in love, loss, grief, and what life there is in the deep, deep sea.

Emma

I used to think it was vital to know things, to feel safe in the learning and recounting of facts. I used to think it was possible to know enough to escape from the panic of not knowing, but I realize now that you can never learn enough to protect yourself, not really.

I thought about the day it first occurred to me that, should she die, there would be no one in the world I truly loved.

Jonnie

I used to think there was such a thing as emptiness, that there were places in the world one could go and be alone. This, I think is still true, but the error in my reasoning was to assume that alone was somewhere you could go, rather than somewhere you had to be left.

Abigail Mills

I think of nothing, then I think about the sea lung, the day on the beach with Leah where the ice sat on the water and the air around us seemed about to take some other form. This alchemist sea, changing something into something else. I think of this and I look at her face, the remains of her face, my Leah. She is looking at me - this now, the last of her - and she is still looking at me when I move my arms to release her, when she melts between my hands and into water, twisting down into the rolling tide. What persists after this is only air and water and me between them, not quite either and with one foot straining for the sand.

How could I know something which simply could not be the case. I remember I saw it- the eye, and then the face beyond the eye, the way it rose up from the chasm below us and kept rising, the way it filled the windows, filled my feld of vision, seemed to fill the whole ocean by itself. I don't know how to tell you this, really. 

She … looks at me, eyes the towels I have piled, sopping wet, in the sink. "OK" she says, "so I guess we'll need water." We fll several plastic bottles from the tap, take out the washing-up bowls I keep under the sink and fill them too, mixing salt into each before ferrying them down to the Volvo. We place the washing-up bowls in the front seats and stack the bottles in the passenger seat before returning to the flat

We slid through the water, the darkness opening out only into further darkness. the lights from the front of the craft and the sensors picking up a geography of irregular basalt, wide open crags of rock that spoke to a broad crevasse - something deep and narrow into which we had fallen - and yet not one living thing. I'm not sure how long I moved us forwards through this darkness, the strange emptiness opening up before us the further we went. I remember now that I caught that smell again - the burning flesh, the rendering of something too hot to keep its form - though I am not sure if that is something I really registered or something I superimposed over the memory at some later point.

adding salt to water weirdifying the water. miri gradually accepts it as normal

I have taken to filling up glass ramekins with table salt and ferrying them into the bathroom, pouring the salt into the water and allowing it to dissolve. I'm not sure what prompted me to Gkart doing this although Im fairly certain Leah appreciates it. to

I lean down over the water. It's hard to describe it - the way her chest seems to brim, a sensation of something teeming. As I look, I see that the skin across her ribs is pulling, clearing, growing transparent like a window wiped of mist. I see her ribs through her skin and then her lungs, expanding, retracting, the whole of her sheer in the water, translucent, transparent and breathing easily, though – submerged as she is - she has no recourse to the air.

This doesn't feel like that," he said, and I wanted to tell him that I disagreed, that I felt certain we were still somewhere where something else existed alongside us, that there had to be something here that we simply couldn't see. I felt, as I often did, an agony at the emptiness, of wanting to see where we were

the ocean is weird because of the creatures and the noises but also because of the silence. it’s not what we expect. the darkness. the lack of anything at all. that’s almost weirder than the giant lovecraftian types

"Did you ever think that maybe this is just a dead part," he said, after a moment, "I mean, not that we're not in the ocean but that we've somehow fallen down into some part of it that died however many years ago and now there's nothing here at all."

 I realise she is standing in the doorway to the hall, naked and still wet, and that one of her eyes is no longer an eye but a strange, semi-solid globe that on closer inspection appears to be made up of pure water. When it bursts, it falls down her face like a yolk escapinga white and I put a hand over my mouth and nose as though anticipating a smell.

something weird happening jelka is hearing something

The shower running in the wash stall and no one using it. I turned it off, told them to be more careful, though both claimed not to have left it on.

I'm trying to heave her out of the bath and then she is leaking water from the beds of her eyes, from the insides of her ears, from the side of her mouth, and her legs are not supporting her

She has fallen, curved into herself like a conch, like something from which a creature might emerge. I get her home again; I couldn't say how, it just happens. As I said before, things go on. I get her into the bath and keep her there until, by degrees, she seems to feel better

She doesn't want to go, but she has been in the bath all day and the drain is clogged with the scum of whatever it is she leaves behind, so I lay out clothes for her and tell her it will help. She moves oddly now, a certain keel to the left as though a piece of her is somehow unsupported. I wrap her up and tell her she'll enjoy it.

before I have lifted her arms to soap as gerntly as possible at the silvering translucent skin underneath.

“I don't know how you can know that," I continue. and shrugs, a squeeze and pulse of unnatural colour around her and shoulders, as though water is massing beneath the upper layers of her skin. "I feel basically OK today," she says, then keeps talking before I can interrupt. "And when I don't, it usually passes." I look at her, at the way she tries to smile and then seems to give up, ducking beneath the water and holding herself there. I look at her and feel unusually sure that the Leah of the previous night was my Leah, but that this one almost certainly isn't. If I cut her, I'm not altogether sure she would bleed.

When I come in, she looks up, head back against the lip of the tub, and her skin seems to shrink and then reshape before me - the stretch and settle of a rubbed eye, briefly off-centre, then nothing u usual at all

There was nothing beyond the window, the way there was always nothing. It made me feel restless, anxious to see something move. This was meant to be a research trip, I wanted to grumble, how are we supposed to conduct research on something we can't see. The water was directionless in its blackness, moving no visible way. It was difficult, particularly if you looked for  too long to imagine there was water around us at all.

131 mundane into the weird and visa versa

"Come over here," she says, and I'm surprised but do as I'm told. I sit beside her on the bed and let our shoulders brush, then lean away again, this gentle touch and then removal. I feel for a moment that I understand the whole bright dailiness of our life before this: the morning glances at the bathroom sink, the spit of toothpaste, the cramp and comfort of our hall and living room and kitchen - understand it and also understand that it is gone.

Leah is changed. A marine biologist, she left for a routine expedition months earlier, only this time her submarine sank to the sea floor. When she finally surfaces and returns home, her wife Miri knows that something is wrong. Barely eating and lost in her thoughts, Leah rotates between rooms in their apartment, running the taps morning and night. Whatever happened in that vessel, whatever it was they were supposed to be studying before they were stranded, Leah has carried part of it with her, onto dry land and into their home. As Miri searches for answers, desperate to understand what happened below the water, she must face the possibility that the woman she loves is slipping from her grasp.

By turns elegiac and furious, wry and heartbreaking, "Our Wives Under the Sea" is an exploration of the unknowable depths within each of us, and the love that compels us nevertheless toward one another.

hannie

"Something I find incredibly boring...is everyone's conviction that love is different for them. Somehow harder. Do you know what I mean? I just don't think it's that complicated, honestly---if you're with the wrong person, it's hard. It's just another way of thinking you're special, the way everyone does when they're a teenager. You think you aren't able to love, except that of course you are. You think you aren't able to love correctly or the same as everyone else, except that of course you are, you just haven't had a chance to do it yet. You're not special, you're just waiting."

[. . .] the thing about losing someone isn’t the loss but the absence of afterward. [. . .] The endlessness of that.

Victoria Justice

the premise sounded so so intriguing and i really wanted to like this, but unlike other atmospheric reads i have enjoyed, it was extremely difficult for me to care about any of the characters. the writing is long-winded and languid, but cold and distant. and perhaps that's the point, but i couldn't find it in me to read on.

countingcrows

I really, really enjoyed it. Every single word. It just seems a touch unfinished. I wish the author had taken the pains to finish the story and fill in some blanks. I love when a story leaves questions unanswered, but the unanswered questions here feel less like the deliberate choices of an experienced author and more like her fear of ruining something beautiful. It's an incredible book, it just needs more meat. The end comes quickly and abruptly, and as someone who wrote a lot of essays like that in college, I get it, but it needs just a little bit more. I can't take off more than a half star for the lack, though, because everything that it does have is so wonderful. It's terrifying and thought-provoking and GAY and simply incredible. I'll be waiting for the deluxe edition 20 years from now, once the author is firmly established as one of the greats.

Tons of potential but didn’t quite hit the mark. The writing itself is very well done but I got too lost in the story.  I get that the ocean is ambiguous and that makes it scary, but this book was too ambiguous. I feel like I still have no idea what happened to any of the characters at any one point in time. 

Nicole Neuman

queer, ambiguous, speculative fiction? DEVOURED. as someone who is already freaked out by the ocean, this was creepy in the best way possible. lets go lesbians.

A poetic, creeping exploration of grief and relationships. The horror remains atmospheric and haunting rather than gruesome. Throughout, I was reminded of This is How You Lose the Time War + Annihilation + Monstrilio + Shark Heart.

Emiley Jones

unique story about grief, love, etc. the way someone can be miles apart but just Right There, and how things can change. how the things you know about a person and who they once were might not be enough to keep them as fresh as they are in their memory. things change, as do people. 

i loved the horror of leah and miri, as it unfolded. i knew it was going to end but not exactly how. 

karina

unique story about grief, love, etc. the way someone can be miles apart but just Right There, and how things can change. how the things you know about a person and who they once were might not be enough to keep them as fresh as they are in their memory. things change, as do people. 

i loved the horror of leah and miri, as it unfolded. i knew it was going to end but not exactly how. 

This was beautifully written and gut-wrenching. I just wish the horror aspects were explained more.

Rebecca Bream

hmm. many mixed feelings for this one.  plenty of loose ends leaving room for lots of speculation, which i enjoy …. to a degree. i loved armfield’s exploration of grief throughout the novel and i grew to care for the miri & leah as a couple. but i’m not sure i’d consider this to be horror? i was looking forward to an overwhelming sense of claustrophobia and terror and dread when approaching this “deep sea horror” read, and i wasn’t particularly satiated by that portion of the reading experience. though it was beautiful in its depictions of guilt and grief, which i suppose is the type of mundane horror in which it summoned.

༺ kat ༻

The best analogy I’ve read about this book is like watching a show with ads. Loved some of the figurative language and the perspective on the sub.

Megan Lown

i think it’d be a good movie. idk it made me sad and it didn’t have a good ending 

Carmen Malca

Beautiful and confusing in the best way. I’m going to think about that final scene in the water for the rest of my life. 

Alli

felicity hu

strangely enough, i think this is the book which i felt the most  that the characters were actually human, human beings. all the time i kept trying to picture Leah  in my mind, first i tried to make her human, her face, her hair, her features, her smile and chin, how aloof she could be and how serene her company used to be, then when i finally worked out a face and a personality, i just kept seeing this character i just created in my mind through Miris’ eyes, i tried to imagine what she saw and what she felt when she saw her face, how could she be in fear or in love or in mourning while looking at her. thats how beautifully written the story is; yes im devastated, absolutely. but for the time these page kept inside with them, i had the opportunity of experience love and lost, i saw love and now i find myself mourning, and i think that is very powerful.

Maria

Our Wives Under the Sea

Wow this was wild. I love the Alien-but-make-it-sad-undersea-lesbians plot but also maybe it’s all an allegory for grief?! 

Amelia Hruby

Kristen Thomas

Weird, haunting, and disturbing in a way that I didn’t particularly enjoy.

Ryan Mateyk

Horror, not so much? Though there were a few chilling moments, what this should really be classified as is sad lesbian. Is that a genre? If not, then this is a unicorn because that's what this book is. Just an overwhelmingly sad (though beautiful) tale about two girlies in love. An octopus pops in as well.

Abbie Duggan

This book is brilliant, and weird, and wonderful. It’s been 10 days I can’t stop thinking about it. Expect stunning imagery, beautiful writing, and a hazy storyline that comes together for a dreamy experience that is honestly, hard to articulate.

Liyah 🤎

A quick and easy horror lit read. Beautiful prose and I enjoyed the rotating POVs and different timelines. Left me a little wanting in terms of explanantions, but I can apperciate the openendedness. Beautiful story about love, grief, and loss with a pretty chilling ending. Not the book for you though if you're looking for jumpscares or gore (which i wasnt).

armoni mayes

This was incredibly beautiful. Proving that you could do amazing fabulistic / metaphorical stories with a lot of emotional impact while keeping them succint and focused. It reminded me of "Arrival" by Jeff VanderMeer and "Into the Drowning Deep" by Mira Grant, both of which I have previously enjoyed, and managed to meet and exceed expectations.

despite the wholesome portrayal of a wlw relationship, decent writing style, fascinating strings of words and fresh links of meanings, our wives under the sea is surprisingly a tough thing to read. and no, utter despair and fear of the unknown have nothing to do with it, it's actually the opposite. for the topics it covers, the book seems watered-down and bleached of raw feelings. they are definitely there, peeking out from under the bland domesticity occasionally, which is not enough to captivate your attention for the first half of it, at least. it's by no means a page-turner, but maybe i've just missed the point, and it really should feel like drowning in a semblance of normalcy, in lack of any urgency. you're witnessing the sinking of a relationship for hundreds of pages, a catastrophy slowed down enough for you to suffocate in its syrupy ordinariness. the story kinda grew on me somewhere in the middle, though, with its portrayal of the endlessness of loss. 

"you go so deep you forget you’re supposed to come back."

lily lily 

despite the wholesome portrayal of a wlw relationship, decent writing style, fascinating strings of words and fresh links of meanings, our wives under the sea is surprisingly a tough thing to read. and no, utter despair and fear of the unknown have nothing to do with it, it's actually the opposite. for the topics it covers, the book seems watered-down and bleached of raw feelings. they are definitely there, peeking out from under the bland domesticity occasionally, which is not enough to captivate your attention for the first half of it, at least. it's by no means a page-turner, but maybe i've just missed the point, and it really should feel like drowning in a semblance of normalcy, in lack of any urgency. you're witnessing the sinking of a relationship for hundreds of pages, a catastrophy slowed down enough for you to suffocate in its syrupy ordinariness. the story kinda grew on me somewhere in the middle, though, with its portrayal of the endlessness of loss. 

"you go so deep you forget you’re supposed to come back."

One of the best-written books I've ever read. At this point the plot becomes irrelevant, which is probably the author's purpose: the mystery of what happened under the sea doesn't matter, the main focus is only on the main characters' marriage

Gemma

kait

This book left me in the biggest state of confusion. Two stars because the writing about grief, ptsd, loss, love, and all the other emotions were incredible but the ending was just frustrating. I feel like the first 1/3 of this book was amazing, the next 1/3 was where I wanted to stop reading, and the final 1/3 was so maddening. We are left with many unanswered questions and an ending that, in my opinion, makes no sense. I am glad I read it (that cover is gorgeous btw) but I am so glad that this is over.

ephe

** spoiler alert **
           i am deeply disappointed, i really wanted to like this book but the story was kinda bland, the passages about Miri’s mother seems useless, Miri is infuriating, her friendships with Sam or even Carmen are pointless. i was puzzles at first i really wanted to know what’s up with Leah but the more i read the more boring it got, i felt like all the facts about the deep sea were here to add some more content to a book that had little to nothing interesting to say. anyway i gave it 2 stars because i really wanted to like it and i feel bad about only giving one star.

A very slow, quiet, strange little book, dealing with love and grief. It is a novel about letting go while grabbing for a chance to continue to hold on. 

The writing is exquisitely beautiful. It ebbs and flows so naturally, akin to the water it references so often. There is a tenderness towards every word used, making each page absorbing and melancholic. 

The dual POV really grabs your attention and captures perfectly the liminal state of the characters within the book. 

As you gradually glide through the pages, you already know where it's going to end. You know this story will leave you broken. However, the intrigue lies not with the journey but in what state you will be left in as this story continues to haunt you long after its end.

A very slow, quiet, strange little book, dealing with love and grief. It is a novel about letting go while grabbing for a chance to continue to hold on. 

The writing is exquisitely beautiful. It ebbs and flows so naturally, akin to the water it references so often. There is a tenderness towards every word used, making each page absorbing and melancholic. 

The dual POV really grabs your attention and captures perfectly the liminal state of the characters within the book. 

As you gradually glide through the pages, you already know where it's going to end. You know this story will leave you broken. However, the intrigue lies not with the journey but in what state you will be left in as this story continues to haunt you long after its end.

Victoria Justice &
Our Wives Under The Sea by Julia Armfield

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Victoria Justice &Our Wives Under The Sea by Julia Armfield

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Victoria Justice &
Our Wives Under The Sea by Julia Armfield