And so, she flees to the surface, escaping the memories, the expectations, and the responsibilities-and discovers a world her people left behind long ago. Yetu remembers for everyone, and the memories, painful and wonderful, traumatic and terrible and miraculous, are destroying her. This demanding role has been bestowed on Yetu. Their past, too traumatic to be remembered regularly, is forgotten by everyone, save one-the historian.

Yetu holds the memories for her people-water-dwelling descendants of pregnant African slave women thrown overboard by slave owners-who live idyllic lives in the deep. The water-breathing descendants of African slave women tossed overboard have built their own underwater society-and must reclaim the memories of their past to shape their future in this brilliantly imaginative novella inspired by the Hugo Award nominated song “The Deep” from Daveed Diggs’ rap group Clipping.

Representation: Black People of Colour (BIPOC), Neurodivergent, Non-Binary (LGBT+), Women Who Love Women (WLW) (LGBT+), Men Who Love Men (MLM) (LGBT+)Ĭontent Warning: Murder, death, trauma, descriptions of slavery from the past, self harm, attempted suicide, suicidal ideation, PTSD, depictions of blood, discussions of genocide and erasure, cultural and intergenerational trauma, drowning, mention of war Summary **There are minor spoilers in the “Content Warnings” and “Review” portions of this post** You say madness such as mine doesn’t exist, but it would exist in you, too, if you had to experience the ugly things I do all the time.

The deep by rivers solomon