There's no real way around saying this. The Pisces is about a passionate and erotic love affair with a mer-man. Hats off to the cover designer who really nailed the brief.

As a floundering PhD student, Lucy is despondent, unfulfilled and recently heartbroken after her long term relationship ends with a doughnut fueled breakdown. She spends the summer house-sitting for her sister and the caveat for staying at the beach house is that she must look after herself and attend group therapy. During the sessions she becomes familiar with a group of women who are all working through commitment issues, disastrous Tinder experiences and sex addictions.  Making parodies of modern 'triggers', author Melissa Broder throws perspective on the Californian, self-help, crystal cuddling, pill popping community of Venice Beach. 

It's Lucy's moonlit walks that leads her to the rocks where she meets an enigmatic swimmer. Beyond the scales and the intense passion that surrounds her nightly encounters, The Pisces reflects on a society currently in grips of an collective state of anxiety. Beyond Lucy's growing dependence on her new relationship, deeper metaphors for mental health begin to surface as the novel shifts to reflect the more traditional and fatal stories of mermaids. Historically these stories have always been tragedies rather than romances so I felt the pressure building to second-guess what Lucy's real motives were for nurturing her new affair. 

The Pisces is loud and un-apologetically primal. Some scenes were uncomfortable to read and if I met Lucy in a bar I'd be eye-rolling and exiting.  I spent a lot of time questioning if her experiences with the man of the sea were even real or if she was having a psychotic episode for a whole summer. But then I gave into it and went with the flow, putting aside any doubts I had that this might just be The Little Mermaid for Mr Grey. 

Read this book with an open mind and allow Melissa's story to pull you under.