Lorali by Laura Dockrill

This book is about mermaid Lorali whom winds up on a beach in Hastings naked with legs after finding out from her mum Queen Keppel about her real father, leading her to reject the sea. She gets found by Rory whose supposed to be celebrating his birthday but instead sets about helping the girl he found and takes her to hide by his home.

His best mate Flynn's grandfather knows about mer folk and knew Lorali's heritage thanks to his love of antiques and history.

As the mer folk led by Queen Keppel send Opal to the human or walkers land to help campaign for the return of their princess, they tell the walkers of their existence shocking them especially when their children come at risk.

Then Lorali gets taken from Rory as his other best friend betrays him as he teams up with the pirates after Lorali. However, Lorali is taken by the Cavities and so the Cavities vs pirates fight ensues.

Overall I enjoyed the book.
Told from a split perspective of Lorali, Rory, the sea personified or another story character I really liked the idea of a mermaids story being told as a tapestry on their tails. I do however have a hard time getting into fantasy fiction books and did find it a hard slog to get through but from persevering, I feel it was worth it. I would have liked there to be a more developed base plot line about Lorali ending up on the beach and what she planned on doing though and I wouldn't think she'd be willing to wander off with any human the way her mer folk spoke of them, surely she would be felt more uneasy.

A sparkling tale of history and fantasy.