WEIRD FISHES

sf novella featuring encounters with intelligent life in the sea

published by stelliform press (2022)

2023 UTOPIA AWARD-NOMINATED NOVELLA

When Ceph, a squid-like scientist, discovers proof of the ocean’s slowing currents, she makes the dangerous ascent from her deep-sea civilization to the uncharted surface above. Out of her depths and helpless in her symbiotic mech suit, Ceph relies on Iliokai, a seal-folk storyteller, who has seen evidence of clogged currents as she surfs the time gyres throughout the lonely blue. Navigating the perils of their damaged ocean environment, and seemingly insurmountable cultural differences, Ceph and Iliokai realize that the activities of terrestrial beings are slowing the spiralling currents of time. On a journey that connects future and past, the surface and the deep, the unlikely friends struggle to solve a problem so big it needs a leviathan solution.

PW, STAR1
publishers weekly, starred review
“Mariz combines dense, realistic science with lush, fantastic description and provides abundant space for the story’s more outlandish elements to stretch out and breathe.”
PW, STAR1
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