1910's New York meets mystic merman in this lgbt romantacy. Benny builds an astounding iron tank for one of the Coney Island side shows in hopes of making it as an artist. When the proprietor sees his handy work he asks Benny along on a secret mission to fill the tank with, his hopes, of the next best side show exhibit. With the merman placed in the tank he built, Benny befriends Rio and finds deeper connections with him than any human he has met. Upon discovering Rio's condition Benny must decide if his budding career as an artist and new found family is worth more than his soulmate.

I loved this book! I loved the time era, the location, even the side show characters we meet along the way made this book so good! My only gripe is that it felt like the book description/synopsis gave away a lot of the story and it was a touch predictable. Without going into too much detail (in fear of giving something away) I cannot wait for everyone to read Benny and Rio's story and hope they love it as much as I did!

It's always so exciting when someone who you've followed for forever in the book community finally get's their foot int he door of the publishing industry. To witness that excitement first hand through a screen from Publishers Marketplace posts to cover reveals to finally, finally getting their hands on a copy of their own work.

Like anyone whose spent any amount of time on or around bookstagram spaces in the last few years I've seen and adored Venessa Vida Kelley's beautiful art, so when I heard she was realising a book with Kensington it landed firmly on my most anticipated reads of the year list.

Kelley's debut novel, When the Tides Held the Moon follows blacksmith Benigno “Benny” Caldera as he navigates the wild and often dangerous world of Coney Island's Luna Park in 1910's New York after the iron work cage he builds becomes the focal point of the show's latest exhibit, a merman stolen from the banks of the East River by Bennie and Luna Park's company of performers. However, as Bennie's life entangles more and more with both the sideshow members and the beautiful merman, Rio, he must contend with the price of Rio's freedom on his own life, and heart.

When the Tides Held the Moon is beautifully written, Kelley showcases a true talent for clean prose and well written dialogue. They bring an underutilised concept (a mermaid x human romance) new life in more ways than one. It's fantastically queer not just in its romance but in its cast of characters who are each diverse and expansive in their own ways. Kelley's effortless inclusion of representation in this novel is beautiful, the found family cast of Lunar Park's sideshow are one of the novel's stand outs and each of them are given rich inner and outer lives which serves to bring the world around Bennie to life.

I, however, couldn't help but feel that the book was too long in some places and spent too much time trying to tell too many stories - or rather trying to give Bennie a place in too many characters stories - for it to really stick the landing every time. This left the novel feeling a little long, with the main narrative often on pause for the sake of the smaller side stories. The book lost its tension often and that made it drag at points.

Overall, When the Tides Held the Moon is a solid debut for Kelley and I'm more than keen to see what comes next from the author.

Thank you again to Kensington and NetGalley for the arc!

First of all let me say one thing - that cover! Wow! I am in awe ... it's one of the reasons I requested this book.

The premise and the setting are interesting too. We're in New York in the 1910's at the height of the 'Oddity trend' where people would go and gawp and the strange and unusual. Benigno (Benny) is a Puerto Rican queer blacksmith and Rio is a merman. They meet, become friends, make more friends with their colleagues and fall in love. It's very sweet and the magical realism is done well.

The illustrations are absolutely beautiful - I want to paper my walls with them.

This a book that highlights diversity and love in all its different forms. I enjoyed reading about the development of Benny and Rio's relationship. There were moments of this book that felt a little slow to me, particularly the beginning.

All in all a lovely story. 3.5 stars

RATING: 2.5/5 STARS

Off the bat the writing in this book read as quite dense and I could not get myself engaged in the story. Love the author's art though, and the illustrations for this are gorgeous.

Beautifully written and very much enjoyed this book.
Only downside was not being able to understand when they started having a conversation in another language. Some translation would have been nice.

Great setting and side characters

This was one of my most anticipated books of 2025, but unfortunately, I need to DNF it at the 20% mark. I want to say right away that there is nothing wrong with this book. I really liked the 20% that I read: good prose, interesting plot, and a very likable main character that you sympathize with from the first pages. The reason why I can't continue reading is purely personal. I am Ukrainian, I live in Ukraine. Most people probably won't understand this, and they have every right to, but when a new character appeared on the pages of this book, the giant Igor from Moscow, I couldn't read any further. Like many Ukrainians today, I am very sensitive to the presence of Russians or anything Russian in books. I'm not saying that the author of this or any other book shouldn't write about Russia, but now, when Trump and his administration are selling my country to an aggressor that has caused me and millions of other Ukrainians so much pain and suffering, I want to avoid seeing Russians, at least on the pages of books. At times like this, I want to escape from reality into the fantasy world of books, but the appearance of this character reminded me of the world I live in. Perhaps one day, in better times, I will return to this story, but for now, unfortunately, it is not my safe place.

When the tides held the moon is a beautiful love story between Benny a Porto Riccan immigrant to 1910s new York who finds a job at a steelworks only to get tasked with building a cage for luna parks latest exhibit.
Benny somehow gets roped into catching the exhibit a merman who he calls Rio. The story of of Benny and Rios subsequent relationship.

The book is beautifully written with a great cast of secondary characters which create a fun oddball found family.

I thoroughly enjoyed the story, setting and characters the only downside was the Spanish conversation with no translation but this is a minor point.

This one wasn't for me, it was entertaining and it had some cute moments but all in all it wasn't my cup of tea.

It took me a while to make some progress, I felt like the first ten or so chapters dragged too much, but then once I read through them, the pacing improves a little, by the middle of the book I read the rest of it in no time.

My main problem is the relationship between Río and Benny, it felt rushed and underdeveloped. And I don't know, something about the power dynamic doesn't sit right with me, so honestly I wasn't rooting for them.


SPOILER


Like Benny holds so much power over Río and then when he literally thinks that he can't free Río because he would lose him forever. Like ??? I understand why he as a character feels that, but come on, how could you say you love someone and then feel like if you free them you would lose them. If you really love somebody and they're suffering and you have a way to free them, you do it at once, no questions asked, because seeing them suffer is worse than losing them.


END OF SPOILER


Another thing is that the writing most of the time, and especially in the first chapters, took me out of the story because of the words in Spanish thrown at random. Don't get me wrong, Spanish is my native language, so I understood it all right, but the thing is, they were words so randomly placed that it disturbed my reading. The phrases I understand, or I would've understood the words if they appeared in the moments where Benny couldn't find the right words in English, but yeah I know I'm being picky.

As for the secondary characters, some of them had a little backstory, but I would've liked to see them more involved in the plot. I understand the focus of the book is the romance, but I felt the secondary characters were there just for plot convenience, and also they were pretty stereotypical to my liking.

All in all, as much as it wasn't a book for me, it was entertaining once its pace picked up and the illustrations were beautiful.

In "When the Tides Held the Moon" we follow Benny, a young immigrant from Puerto Rico who's trying to make a living as a blacksmith in the 1910s New York. When he's tasked to build a special tank for the Coney Island fair, the sponsor of the tank is impressed by his work and hires him to be part of his crew - including him having to help to capture the "attraction" supposed to live in the tank. What follows is a beautiful and original love story that made me root for all characters involved and brought me to tears at various points during reading it.

What I really liked about the story was the setting in New York in the 1910s, as it gave me a glimpse into a time and social setting I hadn't read about before. The dynamic between the group of misfits was very well worked out, and their developing relationships made me quite emotional at times. The relationship between Benny and Rio was so, so beautiful and magical - I can highly recommend reading the book for the exploration of queer love in that sense.

I struggled a bit with the language at times, especially because occasionally there would be some words or phrases written in Spanish without any translation, which disrupted the reading flow at times, but especially the chapters in Rio's POV were absolutely beautifully and lyrically written.

I'd recommend the book to people who are fans of the Shape of Water and who'd like to read a different take on queer historical fantasy romances and the found family trope.

The story of Benny and Rio is a beautiful story of finding love where you shouldn't, or you think you shouldn't. Rio and Benny help each other in so many ways, and their love combines to create one beautiful tale of hope, family, and freedom. I cannot recommend this book enough.

Rounding up from 3.75⭐️

I wasn’t sure about this romantic historical fantasy set in New York in the early 20th Century at first but it won me over in the end.

Set in Coney Island amongst a side show menagerie, this book deals with some dark topics and I would check the triggers that others have highlighted as due to the the time and location there is a lot of prejudice at work against both our main character Benigno and the other side show acts. At first many of the characters seemed quite stereotypical, however we spent more time with them and I realised that this was likely done intentionally as these were turned on their heads as the book unfolded.

I loved getting to know Benigno and Rio, and whilst the trails they faced throughout the book were tough to read, their romance was done beautifully. The illustrations throughout really added to the story too.

—hot merman summer

—1910s Coney Island freak show

—Puerto Rican hero

—found family among the othered

The Basics:

Benigno "Benny" Caldera is a metalworker on the outskirts of his New York community, treated differently because he's Puerto Rican, brown, and "different". Roped into a madman's scheme to dominate the freak show scene with a real, live merman, Benny finds himself captivated with the being he calls Rio... who seems to understand him better than anyone, even his newfound friends in the show, can. But the longer Rio stays in the very tank Benny helps maintain, the clearer it becomes that there's a limit to how long he can stay away from home—and with Benny.

The Review:

Oh, you get two great things for the price of one here—beautiful writing and beautiful illustrations, both executed wonderfully by Kelley. When I read a book about sea people, I want something lyrical. Something seductive. Something that truly hammers home the sense of the separate, of being thisclose to home yet so far away. When the Tides Held the Moon nails those flavors perfectly, while at the same weaving a romance that's both melancholy and funny, sweet and striking.

There's an obvious parallel between Rio being far from home and Benny being far from Puerto Rico—neither one by choice. Kelley makes a great choice from the jump to make Rio understand Spanish; and yet, often he and Benny stick to English. Just as Rio finds it almost too intense to speak his mer name to Benny, so too does Benny have to ease into allowing Rio this vulnerability. They're kindred spirits, while at the same existing in the reality that, as hard as they're falling for one another... Benny is working for Rio's captor (to whom Rio refers as "the Shark"). He's protecting his love, but he's aiding and abetting in an imprisonment that's killing him.

Similarly, those in the freak show—well-drawn, complex supporting characters with their own motivations and contradictions—protect each other while furthering a system that hurts them. Because, well; what choice do they have? One character I won't name due to spoilers is a particularly excellent example of this paradox, and Kelley makes wise choices about their identity and place in the story.

This is a deeply empathetic novel, with a variety of characters who aren't white, who aren't straight, who have disabilities, who live separately from society for other reasons. And while they support each other and relate to one another, there isn't like... a one-to-one, simple "We're all freaks! There are no differences and no clashes and we're all equal!" perspective, a la The Greatest Showman. There's a lot of room for nuance here, and a clear "the road to Hell is paved with good intentions" sense.

And she does all of this while being careful to keep the focus on Benny and Rio's relationship—no easy task. It takes them a while to start getting to know each other, but once they do, the chemistry leaps off the page. Benny is so worried about letting people know who he really is, while at the same time deeply longing to live as he wishes. He's a super practical character, and has convinced himself that he accepts his lot in life... but does he?

Where Rio has the privilege of coming from a society totally world from ours, with different expectations—merfolk aren't homophobic, for the record—and power. But that's gone now, so all he can really do is go "Well that is STUPID, Benny" while trapped in place. It's like, tragic but funny at the same time.

And as their bond grows more intimate... Note that I didn't include a Heat Index rating in this review. Because it's honestly kind of hard to define? Kelley has a very unique approach to "But how do merfolk do it?" which honestly, I always appreciate. It almost felt freakier than anything I would've thought of. There are so many jokes and words I want to make up, but I literally can't without spoiling it.

The Conclusion:

Simply put, this is a beautiful fairy tale about love—the love of your lover, the love of your friends and family, the love of home. It's a very queer romance, and it's a romance with Benny's identity as a gay Puerto Rican man front and center. Which makes the ending... all the more satisfying. Can't wait to see what Kelley does next.

Thanks to Erewhon Books and NetGalley for providing me with a copy of this book. All thoughts and opinions are my own.

MY FAVORITE BOOK OF THE YEAR 🤩

premise: set in 1910s Coney Island, the story follows Benigno “Benny” Caldera, a Puerto Rican blacksmith trying to carve out a place for himself in NYC. he builds an iron tank for a sideshow act at Luna Park, only to realize he’s created a prison—for a merman. get ready, the merman, Río, is more than just a mythical creature. he's sharp, curious, and full of wonder, and Benny is immediately drawn to him. what starts as fascination turns into something much deeper, and suddenly, Benny is faced with an impossible choice: keep Río locked up and protect the only community that has accepted him, or risk everything to set him free.

the story is gorgeous in every way. the writing is lyrical without being overly flowery, the romance is soft yet heartbreaking, and the setting absolutely comes to life. you can practically hear the buzz of Coney Island, feel the salt in the air, and see the glow of the carnival lights against the night sky, the aesthetic was so beautiful I really felt like I was there. the found family aspect is also really well done—Benny’s connection to the other performers is complicated, messy, and real. i wanted to get to know them all. I wanted to be apart of the group. also we can't forget about that illustrations, it was beautiful. they don’t just complement the story; they enhance it, making the whole book feel even more magical.

this is a book about love, love that challenges, love that frees, love that asks you to be brave. it's about knowing when to let go and when to fight for something bigger than yourself. it is the kind of book that lingers long after you turn the last page. this will break your heart and put it back together again, why? the whole story was an experience! it's really one of those rare gems that sweeps you away completely. beautifully written mix of historical fiction, fantasy, and romance, wrapped in stunning illustrations that make every page feel even more immersive. if you love found family, star-crossed love, and stories that pull at your heartstrings, this book is for you. definitely a must read.

thank you so much Kensington Publishing

and to Venessa Vida Kelley, MAMI. WE GOTTA TALK.

WHY. WOULD. YOU. WRITE. THIS.

5 ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

I enjoyed the historical setting, the circus flavor, and the representation of so many cultures (and there's helpfully a glossary in the back for the Puerto Rican).

🌟3.75 Stars🌟
There’s some really great stuff going on here, specifically I love Vanessa’s art throughout. I already own multiple of her pieces and I’m really excited to see how the art looks in print when I get my physical copy of this. I loved Rio as a character, which makes a ton of sense because I love Baz who I think inspired him. His witty bitchiness was just such a fun time. I also really liked the setting of a side show and the quirky cast of characters that come with that.

What kept this book from being a total success for me were just some clunky things that I think came from writing yourself into a corner with the premise. This isn’t one of the stories where a mermaid can transform into a human so that means that Benny is often separated from the side show crew so he can bond with Rio. As a result the connection with them didn’t feel as strong as it could have. I think this could have been remedied with a non Rio related B plot or by changing the manner in which Benny is hired by the side show. I think making him a musician that is close friends to a member of the crew could be a good entry point. That could be a role that Sonia could fill and then we could cut the crush plotline that I hated. The crush plot isn’t necessarily bad it’s just something that gives me mad second hand embarrassment.

Overall though this was a solid debut and I’m excited to see what Vanessa does next. Hopefully more books that include her gorgeous art!

CW: implied off page sexual assault

Thanks to the publisher for providing me with a free e-ARC in exchange for my honest review.

This book was as beautiful and lush as the cover promised. Some of the illustrations didn’t render properly on my Kindle, but the ones that did were absolutely stunning. The author did a phenomenal job of establishing the setting of 1910s New York City with Rich detail and a lot of attention to historical accuracy. This made it really easy to become completely submerged in the setting and the story. The observations on what it’s like to be an immigrant in America, the American dream, and community were vulnerable and timely. The queer romance was a beautiful slow burn that truly tugged at the heart strings.

**This review is based on an e-ARC generously provided to me through Netgalley**
When the Tides Held the Moon is an amazing read! I love how the author uses 1910s New York to create a rich world full of pain, longing, and community. The slow-burn romance between Rio and Benny was beautifully written, and the interspersed artwork truly brought the story to life.
Some of the side characters felt a bit stereotypical. Given that the author was juggling a lot of representation, I understand why they may have lacked depth. Still, I would have loved to see more character development to add dimension outside of Benny and Rio.
Overall, this book was super enjoyable and I highly recommend it!

When the Tides Held the Moon" is a mesmerizing blend of historical fiction, fantasy, and heart-wrenching romance, set against the vibrant and often harsh backdrop of 1910s New York City. The story of Benny Caldera, a talented but marginalized Boricua blacksmith, is one that immediately captivates, drawing you into his world of ironwork, yearning, and unexpected magic.

The author masterfully crafts a rich and evocative atmosphere, painting a vivid picture of Luna Park and its eccentric inhabitants. Benny's discovery of the captive merman, Río, is a pivotal moment, transforming the narrative from a tale of personal struggle to a poignant exploration of love, captivity, and the fight for freedom.

Río is not merely a fantastical creature; he is a fully realized character, intelligent, compassionate, and deeply philosophical. The burgeoning relationship between Benny and Río is beautifully rendered, a slow burn that blossoms into a profound and undeniable love. The book delicately handles the complexities of their connection, highlighting the challenges of their different worlds and the inherent injustice of Río's captivity.

The central theme of freedom resonates deeply throughout the narrative. Benny's internal conflict, torn between his newfound sense of belonging and the moral imperative to liberate Río, is palpable. The story forces readers to confront uncomfortable truths about exploitation and the importance of empathy, even when faced with difficult choices.

Venessa Vida Kelley's stunning illustrations elevate the reading experience, adding a layer of visual richness to the already evocative prose. The artwork, infused with aqua blue and black inks, captures the ethereal beauty of Río and the magical atmosphere of the story. The fully designed chapter headers and endpapers further enhance the book's immersive quality, making it a truly beautiful object.

"When the Tides Held the Moon" is more than just a love story; it's a powerful exploration of identity, belonging, and the courage to fight for what is right. It's a story that will stay with you long after you turn the final page, leaving you pondering the true meaning of freedom and the enduring power of love. This book is a must-read for anyone who appreciates beautifully crafted prose, compelling characters, and a touch of magic.

Firstly, the cover on this is absolutely beautiful and I am absolutely obsessed with it !

The story was a whole vibe from start to finish and I loved it ! .

I would recommend this book to everyone and anyone who loves to read !!

This was such an outstanding read. From the beginning to end I was engrossed. This book was well written and kept me hooked. I enjoyed Benigno’s “Benny” character from the beginning and the romance between Benigno and Rio was so endearing.

Thank you to Erewhon Books and NetGalley for this ARC. Due to be released April 29, 2025.