Read This: Flowers for the Sea

Flowers for the Sea, Zin E. Rocklyn’s debut novella, is a lush, gory, and intimate tale of persecution and persistence. In this concisely-drawn world there has been a terrible cataclysm. The sea has swallowed the land and a dwindling population of survivors takes to an increasingly less-seaworthy ship to save themselves. Resources are limited. Deaths are frequent. The survivors could have been at sea for weeks, or months, or years. They cling to whatever hope they can, even when they have to force that hope onto an unwilling bearer.

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Flowers for the Sea is told by Iraxi, a pregnant outcast barely tolerated by the other people on the ship. Rocklyn reveals the scope of the destruction in subjective piecemeal through Iraxi’s fragmented memory and observations as she tells herself her own history to preserve her own maligned identity. The incomplete exposition is tantalizing, underscoring the loss and terrible dangers Iraxi survived just to reach the point where the story begins. Rocklyn also weaves in subtle suggestions that Iraxi and her lost family are of a different lineage, and may or may not be entirely human. 

Iraxi’s barely-restrained anger at her circumstances drives the story as she is coerced into a role she does not want by companions she cannot trust. Her uncomfortable relationships with the other passengers predate the disaster and are connected to her family’s place in the former world. Her unwanted pregnancy is now seen as a sign of salvation by people who have no other use for her than to give birth to a living child. Iraxi does not see the impending birth as salvation, at all. 

She already knows there are monsters above, monsters below, and the threat of more monsters inside. 

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With Flowers for the Sea Rocklyn creates a beautiful and mysterious dark fantasy whose details remain as enigmatic as Iraxi, and as fascinating to try to understand. The tight narrative focus and complicated internal dialogues make the conclusion all the more stunningly unexpected yet furiously, emotionally true. 

I recommend it highly.