The Changeling Sea

Fifteen year old Periwinkle works at an inn in her fishing village and lives by the sea in an abandoned cottage. Her father, a fisherman was killed when out in the sea, leaving Peri to take care of her mother who has gone into severe depression. The girl who is little more than a child, often finds her mother lost in thoughts looking at the sea as if in a trance, willing her father to return to them, not believing that he is gone forever. Peri meanwhile has taken to living at the cottage of an old woman who lived by the sea and was kind to her. One particular evening, she finds the prince of her land, on the stretch of the beach near her cottage and very soon, an unlikely friendship strikes between the two. Prince comes with his own emotional baggage, something that Peri sympathies with, but is unable to fully understand.

Peri, out of her anger at the sea for having taken her father away and put her mother in this state of utter depression, hexes the sea. Very soon strange things start happening around her. Appearance of a sea creature bound in golden chains, arrival of a mage in the village and the strange sightings by local fisher men all add to the mystery.

Though the happenings in the story affect many, we are familiarized with only a select few characters. There isn't much back story to every one of them but that does not make the story any less enjoyable. Peri and the mage made a great team as they went about handling the crisis. It never turned into a super hero kind of story but slowly edged towards to an ending which I knew would be heartbreaking but hopefully, not entirely without hope. I wish Patrician A. McKillip had given us a little more on the mage and his history. He looked like someone I would enjoy reading more about.

Patricia A. McKillip is undoubtedly one of the best in fantasy fiction. The plot is very uncomplicated but has its surprise elements. and the writing is simply beautiful. The Changeling Sea is an excellent example of how a simple story with love and longing at the heart of it, be such a widely read and loved book in the genre.