This novel is more dark fantasy than the Gothic-type horror I've seen from Cherie Priest, but it was still pretty weird and fantastic and a wee bit creepy. Nia, who lives in the country and works on her grandmother's farm, goes to visit her sophisticated cousin Beatrice in Florida. Beatrice hates Florida (she usually lives in New York). And she hates her stepfather. A lot. And she's not too sure about Nia for that matter. So when a tragedy occurs, and Nia refuses to help cover it up, a chase ensues. As the result of that chase, Bernice is taken into the realm of Arahab the water witch, who wants to waken Leviathan and cover the world with water. And of course it falls to Nia to prevent this.

Some quite unusual characters, especially Mossfeaster, who I really loved. And I love the way Priest writes. I have yet to be disappointed by one of her books. ( )

For an unknown purpose, a sort of earth elemental convinces a man to build a tower in a specific place. In pursuit of a way to awaken her father (Levithan), a kind of water goddess takes a drowning girl and changes her into something new. The girl's cousin is turned into a statue and set in a garden near the shore for reasons which we don't find out until much later.

The book follows a number of different threads and it's not obvious until far into the story how they relate and who is good or bad.

Actually, it's never entirely clear, but if I were a human living in that world, I know who I would want to win.

It's rare to find a book where not having answers is as fascinating as having them would be. But in this book, in which very little has concrete explanations and most of the characters aren't human (even if they once were), the story is more important than the explanations, and I loved it. ( )

http://tamaranth.blogspot.com/2009/06... ( )

Fathom is an entertaining horror novel once it gets going. The problem is that Cherie Priest spends the first 100 pages of her novel setting a scene, complete with pages upon pages of infodumps. One character will tell another character a story about a third character, for instance, or a character will have a prolonged recollection of a scene from his past. In addition, the time in which the novel is set does not become apparent until the last few chapters of the novel. A reader could easily conclude that the novel is set in the present day until the last 50 pages or so, when suddenly that appears not to be so, and all that has gone before must be reassessed. The Cherie Priest of Fathom does not seem to be the assured writer who turned out the superior Four and Twenty Blackbirds.

Priest starts her story (after a short initial chapter that has no meaning until much later in the book; really a prologue) with two strongly contrasting characters, Nia and Bernice. We learn quickly that the latter young woman is a spoiled rich kid with pronounced overtones of extreme violence, while the latter is a poor kid up from the farm who finds herself in over her head, both literally and figuratively, very quickly. It isn’t long before Bernice is in the arms of Arahab, a water witch, and Nia is turned into stone, a decorative figure in the garden of the home that was to have been her residence for a summer’s visit.

Arahab has plans for which she needs Bernice and Jose Gaspar, a sea pirate from eighteenth-century Spain. She wants to waken the long-sleeping Leviathan, which she hopes will destroy the modern human world and bring the old gods back to their prominence. Bernice and Gaspar are set lose in the world in order for Bernice to savor her new-found immortality and the free reign she has been given to inflict as much damage on humans as she likes. That is not their only purpose on land, however, for they have a task to accomplish to aid Arahab in her quest. This requires a trip to see Mr. Poppo, a metalworker with pronounced similarities to the god Vulcan, in Ybor City, Florida.

Another elemental has plans for Nia; she will not spend the rest of her life as sentient stone. For a time she is an object of worship to those who apparently think that she is a representation of Arahab – and who think, as well, that Arahab is interested in their worship. With the help of Sam, an insurance fire investigator, the nameless elemental “hatches” Nia to a new life in order that she might stop Arahab.

Once all the characters are gathered in Ybor City, this novel really begins to cook. Suddenly the status exposition and conversation with random bursts of action becomes all action, and dramatic, high-tension action at that. This is the point at which the underpinnings of the novel start to make sense, and a devoted reader will now find it hard to set this novel aside without finishing it.

One gets the impression that Fathom could have benefited from a final rewrite. Priest has what it takes to write original, exciting horror, as the last half of this novel demonstrates. Moving the characters into place, though, poses a difficulty for Priest here. It will be interesting to read her next book to see whether she can pull together her considerable skills for a truly consistent, frightening story. ( )

In 1930s Florida, Nia visits her snobby cousin Bernice, who has been displaced from high society to live with her new step-father on a tiny island off Tampa. After witnessing Bernice’s murder of the step-father (possibly because of his sexual abuse), Nia flees her cousin and both end up in the ocean, where Bernice drowns and is transformed by an ancient water goddess into a super-powered servant in a plot to awaken the Leviathan, the primordial father of all the elemental gods, whose long slumber has allowed mankind to rise to supposed dominion over the world. Nia is saved from death by a mysterious elemental with dominion over decay, and spends the next four years as a human statue/cocoon before she hatches into a servant of the earth and must stop Bernice and the water goddess from destroying the human race.

Packed with accurate details about Florida in the Thirties; a hideous water-worshipping cult reminiscent of Lovecraft’s Innsmouth; José, a 19th century Spanish pirate serving as Bernice’s mentor; and a bumbling fire insurance agent, Fathom passes back and forth from dark fantasy to atmospheric horror in a gory and suspenseful ride. Told from the viewpoints of teenage Nia, and adults Sam and José, this book works more as dark fantasy a la Gaiman’s American Gods than horror, revealing too much of the unknown plot elements through José’s story and breaking the tension created by Sam and Nia’s narrations. However, the horror element works well when the latter two are telling the tale, and the final chapters build up a nicely tense scene of crisis and desperation as Nia and her companions race to prevent the wakening of the terrible world-destroyer Leviathan. The non-stop action, youthful protagonists, and “old gods” plot will appeal to many teens and both fans of Gaiman and H.P. Lovecraft. Extreme graphic violence and moderate profanity, mentions of sexual abuse. Ages 14+.