REVIEW: Out of the Drowning Deep by A.C. Wise
Last Updated on November 24, 2024
I started my “know as little about a book as possible before starting” policy for book reviews with A.C. Wise’s Out of the Drowning Deep, and it led to a lovely reading experience of subverted expectations. I knew it was a fantasy murder-mystery with a former addict detective, and that’s it. As a fellow addict in recovery, I’m sensitive to how we’re portrayed in media. I expected a plot-driven mystery, some cool fantasy set pieces, and crass comic relief from an addict looking for redemption (and some dark shit considering Grimdark Magazine sent the book to me). After reading, though, I wanted to give a round of applause, a chef’s kiss, and a hoot and a holler to A.C. Wise for the addiction plot line. The book turned out to be a through-and-through character story that I really enjoyed.
Out of the Drowning Deep takes place on a solitary planet orbited by a residential space station, in a universe where all gods have made themselves known. Our main characters are Scribe IV (an automaton who records prayers), Quin (the recovering addict and detective), and Angel (an angel who agrees to help solve the murder-mystery). After the visiting Pope is murdered in the Bastion, Scribe IV’s soon to be defunct monastery, the three team up to solve the case before the Sisters of the Drowning Deep (amphibious nuns who punish people with eternal drowning) rise from the depths to exploit the situation for them and their Drowned God.
Honestly, that’s about it for the central plot. There’s not much to say about the murder-mystery aspect of the book, and it doesn’t feel like the characters or the author are terribly invested in it, either. There’s a genuinely interesting break in the case and a few clues to have some satisfaction in trying to solve the mystery, but it’s not page-turning for that reason. The scenes where the plot progresses feel rushed and mostly there to create new contexts for character development, but I didn’t mind at all because the characters fascinated me. The vast majority of the book is dedicated to separate character arcs.
The thing that made this book totally worthwhile to me was the story around Quin’s addiction, his sister Lena, and an angel who embodies his addiction named Murmuration. Wise beautifully shows that addicts crave relief over pleasure. It’s freedom, for a moment, from a deeper suffering, at any cost. Until it costs everything. Quin finds that relief in the broken, possessive, gentle, predatory, adoring, every-shade-of-seduction Murmuration who is able to devour Quin’s memories of his traumatic past—he is left hollow, but free. When Quin returns to Murmuration, I felt seen in his irrational hope for greener pastures. The other side is always dead and barren, but there is also relief in having nothing to water.
The most beautiful, heartbreaking moments that made me teary are with Lena. I thought the book mindfully and lovingly illustrated the confusing, frightening, furious work of loving—or losing—an addict. She shares the same traumatic memory as Quin. If he loses his, then who can bear witness to her suffering? Out of the Drowning Deep has great character arc pacing. In devastating moments of clarity and self-admission, Lena sees through the maelstrom of her emotions, into the ugly truths behind the dark clouds, with lovely narrative timing that broke my heart. Murmuration is probably the most complicated character, and it was an intriguing puzzle to try and figure out his experience of the situation.
The book’s meditation on bearing witness culminates in Angel and Scribe IV’s arc together, which was satisfying, moving, and cleverly tied-in to the central mystery, as well. However, other aspects of their story deflated at the end. My partner endured several of my soliloquies on the truly interesting conversations they raised, but I wish they were more flushed out by the end.
At the end of the day, the main element that propels me through a story is writing style. I’ve DNF’d many books, some which surely had compelling plots and characters, because the sentences didn’t capture me. Wise’s accessible style in Out of the Drowning Deep kept me immersed in the story, but there were some aspects that were worthy of being taught in a creative writing class. The angels we encounter are able to distort perception, both in their appearance and how characters experience them in space and time. Murmuration can at once appear as a flock of birds and a winged man, a human and a nest of hungry mouths. Scribe IV saw Angel as marble and flame, a storm, a kelp-haired god, both engulfing the horizon and rising from the shore. Instead of indulgent poetics, though, Wise can balance her characters’ perceptions in a clear style. Those scenes reminded me of Peter S. Beagle’s The Last Unicorn. Wise can also ratchet up the intensity on a dime, and the darker scenes with Quin had me racing through paragraphs.
Out of the Drowning Deep is entertaining, moving, and gave me a fresh perspective on myself–what more could I want from a novella? It has moments of brilliance, and I highly recommend it to anyone who lives with or around addiction.
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