Against the Tide

I absolutely loved this prequel to the new live action Little Mermaid movie. Its premise is pretty simple: Ariel's eldest sister is kidnapped right before Ariel's protector ceremony and the book reads like a mystery. Ariel is trying to solve it and working to rebuild her family's relationships at the same time. 

Ariel herself is well-written. It follows suit with other Little Mermaid things from Disney. I quite like Ariel BEFORE the events of the movie when she gives up everything for some guy she doesn't know. They're really going to have to work hard to convince me live action Ariel isn't even more irresponsible than the cartoon one, because now she's not only giving up her family, her world and her very self, but she's also stepping away from the kingdom she's protecting. Being a good protector matters to her in this book, so yeah, they're going to have their work cut out for them to make her come up with reasons for what she does. 

I loved all the sisters, though not right away. Their dynamic is primarily bickering and fighting. Indira and Caspia are close, but they don't really like anyone else except sometimes Ariel. No one really likes Mala except Ariel because Mala was the perfect one they had to live up to. Perla and Karina don't like each other. And Tamika hasn''t been seen since the day their mother died. 

Perla stepped out right away as my favorite. I love her design best, so I'm glad I liked her character in this, too. She's the only one to help Ariel right away. She's kind, warm, funny, a bit fearful but honestly, they all are except Ariel. 

Karina was next. She returned to her kingdom quickly after Mala's kidnapping because she was afraid. She and Perla mend fences and she joins the sleuthing. I got a sense of Karina being very caring. 

Tamika was never shown in a bad light. She's simply traumatized by fear over what happened to their mother. I don't even think she dislikes Mala like the others do, though it's possible she once did. She's sweet and gentle. 

Indira and Caspia can barely be separated. Indira is a bit of a joker, while Caspia is more prissy. Neither of them are rule breakers. It takes them the longest to come around and I didn't 100% get where I loved either, but I definitely liked them by the end. 

Mala herself was barely there, so it's hard to get a good read on her, but I liked what I saw. She has an interesting secret that I won't spoil. 

This book is set when Ariel turns fifteen, as that's when protectorship is granted. She does become protector at the end. 

Each sister has her own MerSong, which is essentially a superpower. 

Each sea has a protector and a resident, which is a sea monster. In this book, the sea monsters take the role of the humans in the movie. They're what Triton fears and what the rest of the seafolk fear. 

The queen's death is different in this book from what it was in Eric's Guide to Merfolk. Not sure which story they'll go with for the movie, but they're both the fault of Ursula and humans, so it doesn't really matter. 

The book has the origins of Flounder (who I liked a lot more in this world than in the original) and the grotto. Scuttle is referenced as a friend of Flounder but doesn't appear. Sebastian is there but barely. 

So yeah, it's basically Ariel solving a mystery alongside Flounder and her sisters and it's awesome.

Little Mermaid: The Haunted Palace

In this book, the sisters and Triton are visiting Duchess Dagmer of the Arctic Ocean to celebrate her 100th birthday. Dagmer lives in an ancient, giant ice castle which is supposed to be haunted.

Shortly after their arrival, the girls are escorted to their quarters by the duchess's great-grandsons, who they met once before and babysat for when the boys visited Triton's palace with their parents.

Some of the girls, like Alana, are afraid of the ghost of Morven, but others, like Attina and Andrina, are not afraid at all. Of course, the boys have conveniently put the girls in the wing that includes the room where Morven died. And it's Ariel who has to occupy that room.

Naturally, ghostly hijinks begin and the perpetrators are obvious from the start. It's the boys, getting revenge for an old prank the girls played on them when they were babysitting. The boys make use of the castle's secret passages to orchestrating their "haunting."

After one sighting, Ariel finds the entrance to the secret passage connected to her room, and she and Andrina lead the others down it. They find the boys and learn that they're behind all this. Then the girls concoct their own plot and get every single person in the castle in on it. At the duchess's big birthday party, Andrina will fake sick, dress up as Morven and come scare the boys, while everyone else pretends not to see him. This all goes swimmingly...or so everyone thinks. Shortly after Morven chases the boys out of the room and wishes the duchess a happy birthday, Andrina comes rushing in, saying she had been trapped in her room the entire time. Looks like the real Morven loves a good joke, too!

No sister facts from this one, unless you count Alana being a bit of a scaredy-cat, though she really hasn't been before.

Little Mermaid: King Triton, Beware!

Another simple, but a bit crazy, plot. The circus is in town and Ariel leads her sisters over to check it out while they're setting up. The meet the merseer, or actually her replacement, who predicts a couple minor things, then says the crown of King Triton will be toppled.

Naturally, there's a debate among the sisters over whether to believe in the merseer or not, but on the way home, both of her minor predictions come true.

So just to be safe, all the mermaids keep an eye on the circus and what better way to do so than to join it? They start training to take part in the act as a surprise for Triton.

Chaos ensues during the show and the king's crown is indeed toppled...as in bumped off his head briefly.

My favorite part is seeing intelligent, well-read Attina be skeptical. After her not so bright showing in Ariel the Spy, she needed to look smarter.

Also, the roles each mermaid plays in the circus are fun. Ariel is a daredevil who gets shot out of a whale's blowhole. Arista works with sea horses, Alana with dogfish, and Aquata with sharks. Athletic Andrina goes with the acrobats. Attina becomes the magician's assistant and poor Adella is a clown, which she hates.

Little Mermaid: Ariel the Spy

And we're back to Ariel being the main character again, but this time she's doing something stupid, so it's not as bad as the earlier books, where she always had to be the one to solve the problem or save the day.

Ariel's reading a book on Mata Herring for school and she gets carried away with the theme. When a substitute teacher turns up instead of her favorite, she concocts this ludicrous plot that this sub has kidnapped her favorite, because they're both in the running for Teacher of the Year. She drags her friend Coral into it, as well as Adella and Attina. Of course she turns out to be very wrong and has to apologize to everyone in front of her father.

No new sister facts in this one. The high point of the book is meeting Coral, who's Ariel's first friend that isn't a fish or a bird. Not that she gets a ton of characterization, but at least she exists. The low point for me was that the author didn't seem to grasp either Adella or Attina. Attina's the bookworm, but she never read the Mata Herring book herself and she seems like one of the smarter characters, so I can't see her really being this silly. And Adella is tasked with talking to the substitute, because she thinks he's handsome, and she bombs it completely and looks like a total airhead. Definitely the worst of the first six books.

Little Mermaid: Arista's New Boyfriend

                

This one is quite simple. The princesses and their father are off to their brand new summer palace for the season. Arista doesn't want to go, because she'd rather spend the summer working with her sea horses than meeting titled merpeople. 

Once there, the other girls are all excited about meeting boys and dancing and parties (and reading, if you're Attina), but Arista goes to check out the new stables. 

And there she meets Dylan, the stableboy, son of the groundskeepers. He's the most handsome merboy she's ever seen and the best rider. 

So begins Arista sneaking out of parties to ride sea horses with Dylan, who becomes her riding instructor, friend and boyfriend. 

However, she keeps him a secret from her family, because she's afraid of her father's reaction to her hanging with a commoner. Ariel of course is the one to find out and then the one put in danger when Arista abandons an important earl's son at a party. Arista and Dylan use their riding skills to drive off the devilfish that's after Ariel and save the day, earning the respect of the titled merpeople and Triton. Although he is sure to admonish Arista for not telling him about Dylan. Dylan finds himself a part of summer social circle and presumably he and Arista can openly see each other for the rest of the summer. 

No sister facts this time. Arista gets the most character development of any sister aside from Ariel so far, so that's something. This is when I started to like her after her poor showing in Nefazia's book.

Little Mermaid: The Same Old Song

This one's got a basic plot. The sisters are getting ready to perform a musical gala that's important because Triton invited the Mer-Rajah of the Indian Ocean to come. Sebastian gets called away to conduct a jazz band and Triton orders he go, leaving the sisters on their own to prepare and perform.

Some of them want to try something new: performing a play Attina wrote. Others want to do what's expected of them.

As expected, both projects fail on their own. It's only when Ariel (of course) gets the idea to do a musical that things work out and the performance is a success.

Sister Facts:

Andrina is the most athletic.

Attina confirmed the "bookworm of the family."

Aquata is a skilled ballerina.

In Attina's play, there are six sisters with talents. These seem to correspond to the girls' talents: dance (Aquata), singing (Ariel), athletics (Andrina), beauty (Adella), and juggling (this is mentioned later to be Alana). There's also mention of an artist. By process of elimination, this has to be Attina or Arista, but I think it might be Arista, as Attina ends up playing the singing sister in the play.

Ariel isn't a good dancer.

Attina's the only sister who can hit the high notes.

There's an error on page 52, where Aquata is drawn instead of Adella.

Poor Adella thinks she doesn't have as much talent as the others, which is why she focuses so much on her looks. She feels they're all she really has. This might be when she became one of my two favorites. (The other, of course, is Attina.)

Little Mermaid: Reflections of Arsulu

This one's got a pretty basic plot, but it also has the most appearances of the sisters other than Ariel. Ariel's pretty much been the focus of the first two books, but while she takes the lead in solving the problem, she shares the spotlight far more equally with her sisters.

Adella befriends a new mermaid named Arsulu, who is searching for her lost betrothed. Arsulu seems very sweet and everyone likes her, but not long after her arrival, the sisters are all at each other's throats. Only Ariel is suspicious and it's she who discovers that Arsulu is Ursula in disguise and of course, it's Ariel who saves the day.

The best part of this book is learning some more sister facts!

Alana is really good with sea creatures.

Aquata takes ballet class. 

Arista took a cooking course.

Andrina's a bit wild and also rides sea horses like Arista.

Attina loves reading.

Adella is very quick to think the source of every issue is envy.

Little Mermaid: Nefazia Visits the Palace

Ah, this one. The sisters do not act well in this book. The best character is Nefazia, who is just fabulous. She's the strong, adult female figure the girls really need as a role model.

The book opens with the sisters awed by the procession arriving at the palace from the Indian Ocean. The visitor is Nefazia, an old friend of Triton's from his youth. He lived with her family for two years while studying. Nefazia is gracious, charming, adventurous, and tells amusing stories about young Triton. The mersisters are all smitten...except Aquata.

Aquata does not show her best colors in this book. She feels her position as intended ruler of the kingdom is threatened by Nefazia, because she thinks Nefazia and Triton will marry. She manipulates the other sisters into going along with a series of stupid pranks designed to drive Nefazia away. Ariel agrees because she's afraid a stepmother will restrict her freedom. And she overhears Nefazia and Triton discussing how "all this will change" which backs up her fears.

After a couple failed pranks, Ariel happens to follow Nefazia to the surface, where she lures a ship toward her, then sends it away, telling it that mermaids are only a dream. Nefazia shares Ariel's interest with the human world and Ariel boldly shows her the grotto where she keeps her human treasures. Ariel and Nefazia form a strong bond and she sticks up for Nefazia when her sisters want to keep plotting. Attina and Alana lean toward siding with Ariel, while Arista and Adella are still on Aquata's side.

The newest plot is fake letters. Andrina slides to Ariel's side, but even though they agree, the sisters on her side still won't tell Ariel what the plot is. Aquata has written a letter to Nefazia, notifying her that her sister is sick, so Nefazia rushes to leave on her own, leaving a note for Triton to tell her staff to follow. Aquata destroys Nefazia's real note to Triton, leaving a nasty one in its place. This time Andrina seems more on Aquata's side, while it's Adella who's wavering. Aquata and Arista continue to be complete bitches. Like they really do not look good here at all. Very selfish and cruel. And it only gets worse, because Sebastian appears, saying that Triton just sent word that a pod of killer whales is nearby and everyone must stay in the palace, as killer whales eat merpeople.

The seven sisters race after Nefazia with Sebastian poking along behind. Aquata confesses to writing the letter and the whales pass above them, so Nefazia directs them to lie still and be silent. They almost make it until idiot Arista says something loudly. Then one whale comes down to check them out and they flee. Nefazia distracts the whale from Arista and Adella, who are lagging, and Ariel goes to help her. Nefazia makes a conch shell into a horn, as she did in an old story she told the girls at dinner her first night, but she's hurt before she can use it. Ariel saves the day by blowing into the shell and making the whale think its pod is calling it.

The plan comes out and Nefazia says she and Triton think of each other as siblings, not romantically at all. Triton arrives then, angry everyone is out of the palace and in danger. Nefazia covers for the girls. Triton says her packages from the Indian Ocean have arrived and the girls head home to see the real reason Nefazia is visiting. Triton asked for her help in redecorating the sisters' rooms to reflect their increasing maturity. (Ha. Not so mature at all.) Nefazia has Ariel's room redone with an abstract mural of the sunset over the ocean's surface and a small wishing star in the corner. Ariel ends the book by saying she wants to grow up to be like Nefazia.

I do like this book because of the character of Nefazia. She's fantastic. But it took a while for me to like Arista and Aquata after this. Aquata's childish, stubborn insecurity and Arista's cruelty and stupidity are hard to forgive.

Sister Facts:

Aquata once again named eldest.

Arista loves sea horses.

Adella's interest in fashion mentioned again.

Little Mermaid: Green-Eyed Pearl

I love my new doll set of Ariel and her sisters, so I decided to do a quick reread of the chapter books that made me really adore the girls.

These are short, simple chapter books written between 1992 and 1994.

The books have lovely colors and cute black-and-white illustrations inside.

The first book is about an unwanted guest at the palace. Spoiled Pearl is the type that convinces adults she's sweet as pie, but she's actually quite the snotty, selfish, manipulative mermaid.

Being the same age, poor Ariel is saddled with her. Pearl sees Ariel and Flounder carrying loads of glasses to Ariel's secret grotto and uses the knowledge that one of King Triton's daughters likes human objects to manipulate Ariel. Ariel's forced to basically be Pearl's servant and the bitchy mermaid gets them into a couple really dangerous situations. Thankfully, it finally comes out that Pearl did not see Ariel's grotto, just the glasses, so Ariel dumps the glasses and she's no longer under Pearl's control.

I love these books for their details about Ariel's older sisters. There's a lot of debate about the girls' birth order, but I've always stuck with what the books (and the early comic series) say. I'll be summarizing the plot of each book and then listing off what new tidbits we learned about the sisters.

Aquata is named the eldest.

Adella is shown to be vain and into beauty stuff.

Sadly, that's all for this book. It's mostly centered on Ariel and Pearl.