Things We Found When the Water Went Down
In Tegan Nia Swanson’s mystery novel Things We Found When the Water Went Down, three generations of women seek to protect a damaged world.
In the midst of a blizzard, Marietta is accused of murder and escapes custody almost as fast as she was arrested. With everyone else in town indifferent or hostile to Marietta’s fate, only her teenage daughter Lena knows where she went: the world Below, where the female victims of violence gather. Now, Lena must continue her mother’s mission to preserve what is good about the world Above by sending it Below, even though all she wants is to rejoin Marietta, either in this world or the other.
Set in a desolate town ravaged by environmental catastrophes, Lena cares nothing about finding the real murderer, whose victim perpetrated numerous horrific crimes. The world Above is apocalyptic, buckling under the strain of pollution and overmining. The world Below, while strange and barren, has grown more inviting with every plant, animal, and object Marietta—and, later, Lena—brings down to it.
Lena collects diary entries, interview excerpts, newspaper clippings, and more to clarify the events leading up to the murder. They paint a grim picture of a community drowning in large and small disasters of its own making. The women in Lena’s family are often the only ones willing to fight for change, so they have always been feared for their strange and bold behavior. Even when dead or missing, they remain to haunt the loved ones they left behind, providing strength and a roadmap to a better life—if only Lena can interpret their words in time.
Things We Found When the Water Went Down is an ethereal, mixed media mystery novel about what we lose when the strongest, most vulnerable among us are made to disappear.
Reviewed by
Eileen Gonzalez
Disclosure: This article is not an endorsement, but a review. The publisher of this book provided free copies of the book to have their book reviewed by a professional reviewer. No fee was paid by the publisher for this review. Foreword Reviews only recommends books that we love. Foreword Magazine, Inc. is disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255.
