Lions and tigers and Mermen? Oh my.

This book was brutally honest and uniquely human. It follows Lucy, a thirty-something woman who feels like she's failing at love and her Ph.D. Lucy, struggling with her anxiety and desperate for a break, takes up her sister's offer to dog-sit Dominic (my favorite character, by the way!) for the summer. It's while she's dog-sitting that Lucy meets Theo, an attractive and mysterious swimmer. It is at this point when Lucy starts to question what she thought she knew about love, attaction, and especially life.

The Pisces was one of the strangest books I've read all year. It honest about the human body in a way that most books just gloss over. It gave almost gross descriptions of bodily functions that people try to pretend don't happen and, while I had moments of, "Wow, that's disgusting", it made me come face to face with what it means to be human and everything that entails (yes, even the gross parts).

In addition to being real and human, this book dipped into the realm of fantasy with Theo. It brought in the fantastical element of a merman, but still made Lucy's relationship with Theo (as well as all of the other men) brutally honest. It brought dating in your late thirties and struggling with anxiety to light. It didn't romanticize anything. Which is partially why I loved to hate Lucy. From the outside, I could see everything she was doing to mess up her life, but, as someone who struggles with anxiety too, I could also put myself in her position and see exactly why she was living her life the way she was.

I give The Pisces 3.5/5 stars. It was bizarre, honest, fantastical, but there were moments I felt that it slowed and I was dragging to get through it. I wanted to like Lucy more and, while I could understand her motives (or lack thereof), I also felt like I wouldn't get along with her in real life.

Lucy has been writing her dissertation for thirteen years when she and her boyfriend break up. She's down in the dumps, and her sister Annika, who lives in Los Angeles, insists that Lucy house-sit for her. This includes caring for her diabetic dog. Even so, Annika is sure that getting out of Phoenix is just what Lucy needs to clear her head and start over. Lucy doesn't exactly agree. Although the house and property are picturesque, she still has to go to her love-addiction meetings---which, by the way, don't help at all---and her Tinder dates which aren't any better. Things change, however, when she meets a steamy swimmer while sitting on the beach rocks. This is her chance to put a positive spin on things. Can she make it work with him or will it be another Tinder-like fail?

I struggled from page one to get into this book and in the end, couldn't finish it. The level of self-loathing in the main character was more that I could tolerate.

Lucy struggles after breaking up with her long time boyfriend. She moves into her sister.'s beach house for the summer and meets a merman. This is a story about mental health, obsession and suicidal tendencies. Will she give in to her obsession with the merman or let it go?

I loved the name of this book and also the cover. That is as far as the compliments go. Had to skim to complete this work and even that did not get me to the end quick enough. Lucy is a women who is failing at fulfilling the requirements of her thesis and continues on a depressive avenue when her boyfriend finds another lover. Going to her sister's house to watch over her dog also proves too much for Lucy. Therapy and the appearance of a merman cannot save this character. Way enough said. "A copy of this was provided by Crown Publishing via Netgalley with no requirements for a review. "Comments here are my honest opinion."

The main character is a terrible human being and the book was off-putting in a way that did not make me feel challenged or interested, but just depressed. I don't need to like all the characters I read, but I do have to find them interesting enough to keep engaged. It was like having to read the incessant self-absorbed thoughts of that friend who is destroying her life and she wants to constantly talk about the man she's obsessed with and why hasn't he called, and how could life be this unfair, etc. I gave this two stars because there were a few moments of dialogue that were genuinely funny, and I'm sure there is some bigger metaphor and it's all so deep, but I was just not engaged enough to care about sorting it out.

I couldn't finish it, just didn't engage me, but I'm sure there is a reader for it.

If you're a fan of So Sad Today (the book or the Twitter account), you know Melissa Broder's aesthetic - sad, sexy, a bit off-putting. The Pisces is more of the same - and that's a great thing. I really enjoyed this one. It's heartbreaking, tragic, erotic, and unique - sometimes all at the same time. If you're a fan of Melissa Broder, definitely check this one out.

Ugh. What a self-pitying load of crap. Off.putting and sad.