Cover Image: Our Wives Under the Sea

Our Wives Under the Sea

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Member Reviews

I found this slim book really beautifully haunting. It’s a strange story, with spare writing, told from both wives point of view. Miri who was left behind, and Leah, who is gone so long, suffers real trauma and comes back changed. I know this doesn’t cheerful (and it really isn’t), but it really spoke to me about the ‘sickness’ and ‘for worse’ parts of marriage vows, about end of life care, and truly being there for someone you love, and the loneliness of how that can feel. Weirdly affecting, I’ll keep thinking about this for a while.

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Loved this wonderfully weird book! A woman goes on a deep sea research trip and their submarine sinks to the bottom of the ocean. She comes back... changed... and her wife attempts to take care of her. This book was subtly eerie and I love how the author built up the dread. This won't be for everyone but it was certainly for me.

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gorgeously written prose, definitely a slow build but once the information starts getting slowly revealed it becomes a haunting story reminiscent of a folktale. really enjoyed this one but definitely have to be in the headspace to absorb the slow pace.

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What did I even just read?
This book is 90% vibes, 10% plot. Normally that's not my type of book but I think I loved this? It's a whole mess of juxtapositions. Leah's perspective from under the sea is dull but creepy both in that dullness and all on its own at the same time. Miri's perspective was heavy with boring details of daily existence but had deeply unsettling moments blended in. The ratio of unsettling components grows and grows until the resolution, if you can call it that, which is horrifying and also bizarrely peaceful. The book feels slow but fast. I can't even say what I would compare it to without spoiling it. I think this will be something that prompts strong reactions, both negative and positive, from its readers. I don't think there will be many people in the middle.
I need someone to discuss this with.
CW: body horror
Thank you to NetGalley for the eARC I received in exchange for an honest review.

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This was a unique read. The main character is a researcher on a submarine that loses control and stays underwater for many months. When she returns to flat land things aren't quite right. Addicted to salt and baths with no appetite, her wife frets while the story goes back in time to before the wife came back. Beautifully written with themes of attraction and solitude and metamorphosis.

Copy provided by the publisher and NetGalley

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What an absolutely incredible debut! I'm not just saying that because one of the POVs has the same name as me, but, egotistically, Leah may have been my favorite character. I just really dug her POV. The dynamics between Miri and her was really fascinating, and I was so very intrigued from start to finish. There are definitely some horrific, disturbing aspects of this story, but not overly so. Highly recommend!

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Going into this book blind, I had no idea this book just under 250 pages would be so impactful.

A harrowing speculative fiction love story that is told from the sides of each wife. As one becomes very cold and distant after her trip as a marine biologist. What could be the reason and is there a reason for the distance?

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In Our Wives Under the Sea, Lea, a marine scientist, ends up on the ocean floor for months longer than expected after a research trip gone horribly wrong. Miri tries desperately to find out what has happened with very little answers. One day, Lea is back, but she is different. What follows is an eerie, quiet, unraveling.

I'm not sure what genre this is. I saw another reader describe it as like a Grimms' Fairy Tale and that feels right. We very slowly learn what happened on that ocean floor and how it is literally changing Lea. It's about loss, grief, and when to let go. Read this if you are looking for an atmospheric and short albeit sometimes slower read. I'm very glad I gave it a read.

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***3.5 Stars On My Instagram Account***

"There's a difference between understanding and forgiving."

Our Wives Under The Sea by lyrically poignant author Julia Armfield broke my heart while confusing my mind. Just like the dual POVs I felt like I was reading (and hearing) two different versions of the same story.

Mira and Leah are barely holding on as a married couple, let alone their own sanity, when we meet them. Through Mira we learn how the couple met and fell in love and how when Leah left for a three person research mission in a submarine for a month she became overwhelmed with grief when Leah is gone for six months and presumes her to be dead.

Through Leah we learn about the claustrophobic horror of being trapped in a submarine at the bottom of the totally black lifeless sea hearing haunting sounds and seeing disfiguring bodies. Her mind must be slipping from reality because what she hears and sees can't be real.

When Leah is rescued Mira sees Leah is different and seems to be slipping away from her. She spends all her time with the tap water on, in the bath or listening to a sound machine's unworldly noises. There is no more talking, love making or connection.

I was blown away with the intense performances by narrators Robyn Holdaway and Annabel Baldwin. I felt the fears, grief and loss of these characters.

There is so much left open to interpretation and it is definitely perfect for book club discussions. I wasn't sure at times if it was a horror thriller, literary fiction, or an atmospheric gothic tale of losing oneself. The author wrote with such lilting beautiful prose and I was swept away by her imagination and her ability to tell a poignant love story while giving me creepy scary goosebumps. Definitely an original body of work.

I received a free copy of this book and audiobook from the publishers via #netgalley for a fair and honest review. All opinions are my own.

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Written in a haunting style with an omniscient future pov and an “idk-what’s-coming-so-I’m-happy-for-now” pov is so jarring. I think larger events aside, this book at its center is about navigating a relationship when there’s trauma that can’t be shared or understood in a way that is needed. It’s about learning how to be, in a way that honors what you were but is good for who you are.

I will say it moved a little slow and I was definitely confused at times. But overall, there’s something eerie about it that kept me reading.

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This book was so unexpected. I wasn't sure what it was going to be as I started reading it, and from some hints I kept wondering when certain things would happen. I thought it could go in a straightforward route, or more to the horror genre. I think it did a nice little blend. The women were fascinating, revisiting their lives and the bizarre journey they had to go on together was wonderful. I kept wanting to find out what was going on, and that just made every moment a treat.

I will say that I thought some of the language was bizarre. There seemed to be a microaggression that I couldn't tell if the author felt was intentional or not, and one of the main characters felt a bit flat. We were told we should feel sad for her, but I found her a bit of a question mark.

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I will start by saying I read Our Wives Under The Sea in basically one sitting. It was captivating from the perspective of looking at a relationship from each partner's eyes. I have a feeling the author had a metaphor in mind with the "horror" aspect of Leah's journey under the sea. However, I didn't care for it. If a writer has a metaphor in mind, I want to be able to figure out what it is trying to say. In the case of Our Wives Under The Sea, all I can come up with through Leah's side of the story was so high level and simple that I surely can't be right. If I am, then none of the "under the sea" imagery was even necessary. I was hoping for a horror story with a side of character/relationship study from the description. What I got was a relationship study, but very little interesting about the horror....it was too slow and the ending of it was almost a copout in that nothing was explained, at least not to my satisfaction.

So I settled on 3 stars because I enjoyed the relationship aspect of the two narrators, but overall, I really didn't like the "horror" part of the story.

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After a deep-sea excursion that ended in tragedy, Miri is relieved and happy to finally have her wife Leah back at home. However, Miri begins to realize that this is not “her Leah” the Leah who has returned has changed, whatever happened under the sea has stayed with her. Miri tries to move on with their regular life despite Leah’s odd behavior: running the water taps day and night, being locked up in the bathroom sitting in the bath for hours, and hardly eating. Day by day Miri is slowly coming to the realization that the Leah she once knew may be gone forever.



This was a very strange and eerie book. The writing was hauntingly beautiful and used the setting and plot line to describe grief, love and loss in a unique way. I really enjoyed the writing in this one, The plot was interesting and the story contained so many different aspect such as romance, horror and science fiction. I would not consider this a fast-paced horror story more so I’m the process of grief of loss but in this situation under very peculiar circumstances. I can see this one not being everyone’s cup of tea but for me, I really enjoyed the oddity of it, and it has long stayed with me after I finished it. Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for an eARC copy of this novel in exchange for my honest review. This title is now available for purchase!

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"Our Wives Under the Sea" by Julia Armfield was a unique, quirky, interesting novel about a deep submarine dive going very wrong. I loved the dedication, tolerance and love between the two main characters, and very much appreciated the subtle development of the aftermath affects and demise. Overall creative and well developed. Thank you NetGalley, the author and publisher for the copy for review. All opinions are my own.

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This was a very dense story that was distracting at times with the level of detail. The slow pace made it hard to focus and was ultimately a DNF for me. This one was not for me but I hope others enjoy!

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Haunting and absolutely lyrical, OUR WIVES UNDER THE SEA was one of my most anticipated releases of 2022 -- and I'm beyond thrilled to say it did NOT disappoint! For such a slim whisper of a novel, its brief pages packed a punch and even now, four months after having read it, my mind still goes back to these characters.

I would have loved to have seen a bit more horror, but what an absolute delight this was and I can't wait to read more of Armfield's work!

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<B>I RECEIVED A DRC FROM THE PUBLISHER VIA NETGALLEY. THANK YOU.

My Review</b>: First, read this:
<blockquote>The space around us is a claw half grasped, holding tight without quite crushing, and I wish, in the idle way I always wish these days, that I felt more confident in my ability to breathe.
–and–
I used to think there was such a thing as emptiness, that there were places in the world one could go and be alone. This, I think, is still true, but the error in my reasoning was to assume that alone was somewhere you could go, rather than somewhere you had to be left.
–and–
Her tone is perfectly reasonable, even kind. Beneath it, however, there is little enough in the way of feeling, a chilly blank where the rest of her voice, as I know it, should be.</blockquote>
Don't think for a moment that this is ever an easy book to read. It's not long, only 240pp, or probably 85,000 to 90,000 words. It's a supremely effective exercise in lovely phrase-making that adds up to an eerie atmospheric story of two women in a marriage based on so many broken places and invisibly tiny hooks on long, thin, almost undetectable filaments that intertwine with the other's reaching filaments...no telling whose reach in, whose reach out, the effect still mimics velcro for the soul.
<blockquote>I used to think it was vital to know things, to feel safe in the learning and recounting of facts. I used to think it was possible to know enough to escape from the panic of not knowing, but I realize now that you can never learn enough to protect yourself, not really.</blockquote>
I felt my impatience with Miri, the wife on land, wax and wane several times during the read...in life I'd find Miri intolerable...and I found Leah more and more relatable, as the quote above could've been ripped out of my mind and prettied up some to be Leah's voice. I understood these two women being together, and I understood why Author Armfield introduced a new Leah-like character to be active for Miri the passive, the sea-like all-absorbing heatless Miri. I understood...but I didn't love.

Too much of what happened reminded me of Jeff VanderMeer's <I>Annihilation</i>, possibly more the filmed version than the book. Too many things left off, <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-dnzhPprVVU">dangling conversations</a> like the one in the ancient Simon & Garfunkel song. The eerieness of it is very close to ennui at times, Leah speaks of exhaustion that feels bottomless and that unfortunately is what I took away from this read.

But oh my goddesses, the beautiful phrases. The beautiful, beautiful phrases, the concepts caught in their gem facets, oh my goddesses. Give me that all day long. I promise I won't complain a peep about the "plot".

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This was such a unique book! I have not ever read anything quite like this book before. It is beautifully written, a bit slow, thoughtful, and also sad. It is a book that I will remember for a long time as it really made me think.

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[2 Stars]

This was one of my most anticipated reads, but unfortunately, it really let me down. The first half was quite gripping and I loved every minute. But then the monotonous pacing and repetitive plot just became really boring. I can see how some could love this (and clearly people have), but it just wasn't for me, personally

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"Our Wives Under the Sea" by Julia Armfield is a story about love, grief, and loss!

Miri's marine biologist wife, Leah, is finally coming home after six months at sea. A submariner exploratory mission that should have taken three weeks, ends in a mysterious disaster without meaningful communication from the 'Centre' for months. Miri still has questions that remain unanswered by Leah's employer.

Miri and Leah live together in the same flat but in different spaces now. Miri eats alone in the kitchen and sleeps alone in the spare bedroom. Leah spends a great deal of time locked in the bathroom running water from both taps. She doesn't eat but craves copious amounts of salted water.

Miri notices the differences in Leah. She sees Leah doing these alarmingly odd things and how her body is physically changing. Leah seems to be fading away. Is Miri different now, too?

I will say, and I'm sure about this, I have not ever read anything quite like this book before. It's beautifully written, oddly slow, a bit repetitive, thoughtful, and deeply sad. It's the kind of book that causes you to dig deep within and continue to think about it for a long time afterwards.

The alternating chapters tell the story via the first-person voices of both Miri and Leah. The story travels back into the memories of their relationship, with snippets of what happens under the sea, mingled with the current timeline once Leah is back home.

I read the digital copy and listened to the audiobook choosing to switch back and forth between the two short formats. The audiobook has two narrators, Annabel Baldwin & Robyn Holdaway, which gives each of the main character's a unique voice. I believe this is what gives listening a more emotional experience. With the digital copy, the visual experience of reading the printed word is an experience I will always find comforting!

I enjoy reading books that are different and this creative and beautifully writing debut novel hits that mark for me. It's a story that I continue to think about and dissect over and over again. Like Leah, it keeps changing. It's that kind of story for me. I highly recommend!

Thank you to NetGalley, Flatiron Books, Dreamscape Media and Julia Armfield for a free ARC and ALC of this book. It has been an honor to give my honest and voluntary review.

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