Coming Up for Air

Interesting take on mermaid lore, kind of a mix of Harry Potter merpeople and Hans Christen Anderson's.
Leigh is rescued from beneath the docks by Tolly which starts a spell in which Tolly gets legs but only for a full moon-cycle unless he can get the other person in the spell (Leigh) to proclaim love. Tolly has his voice and various other mer-powers like siren song, super-human strength, and the ability to change his appearance from his “monstrous” “true self” to what people typically think of mermaids to a regular human man at will. This comes in handy as Leigh is a criminal in an Irish mob and has a little to prove to either go up in rank or get out to live his own life.
The plot and characters get a little too busy for such a short book - we seem to meet everyone on Leigh's floor in his apartment along with the higher-ups in his gang AND the rival Italian gang that tried to “feed him to the fishes” at the beginning of the book. We also have, on top of Tolly's story and trial, Leigh's best friend (and son of the mob boss) Alvin's love life and apartment-friend Ralph's love and burgeoning criminal life as well.
A lot of the side-plots could definitely have been whittled down or completely abandoned with more focus on Tolly being in a new world. The fact that he learned so much from movies “watched from the shoreline” seems way too convenient, especially since I can't think of a single drive-in theatre or in-a-park movie that he'd be able to see and hear clearly, especially in the last 10 years. It doesn't make much sense and I think all the movie references peppered throughout were a little distracting.
The narrative would have also benefited from not being set in modern times, maybe more like in an era when mobs and organised crime were in their heyday.


Overall, an entertaining read not without its problems but different than anything I've personally read.