You did it! We figured this one out! It is a truth universally acknowledged (by me for certain) that the Bitchery pretty much knows everything, and really, it's true. Scroll down to see the solution for this HaBO - and many thanks!
Welcome to Tuesday, better known here as HaBO Day! HaBO, or “Help a Bitch Out,” is our attempt to reunite readers with romances that they can remember parts of, but not the important parts like the author’s name or the title. This HaBO request comes from Kira, who is trying to find a YA romance:
So, I’ve exhausted all ways of finding this YA romance from years ago, sadly, despite the plot being pretty unique.
The protagonist is a teenage girl: her parents are marine biologists and they take her to live on an underwater science station. Once they get down there, the station starts falling apart and it turns out the fish, including all the whales in the area, are very angry at the intrusion. She has some ability to talk to them, but I don’t believe it was paranormal–she was a teen genius and it was science related–but nevertheless one of the adults around decide that she’s bad luck and lock her in one of the flooding labs.
Cue teenage boy who rescues her and defends her as she climbs through the ducts of the station, trying to save everything from falling apart. She ends up staying on the station and dating teen boy and chatting with whales regularly, which seems pretty cool to me.
I think the cover had bubbles on it and like, a yellow circle–I read it in the early 2000s, but it might have been published earlier.
A YA heroine who can communicate with whales and fish. Come on! Someone knows this!
Is it “Deep Wizardry” by Diane Duane?
Which FYI is my total favorite wizard series that I definitely need to revisit, it’s been waaay too long.
Songs of Power by Hilari Bell? If that’s the one you’re looking for, then it’s a cool coincidence because I had also been trying to remember the title for years and found it just this week when looking at book covers by artist Greg Newbold.
I’m so curious to find out what this is!
The “Songs of Power” book that Becca mentions has a yellow circle on the front, but the heroine isn’t a scientific genius…more like a magical genius?
Description copied from Amazon:
“Imina knows nothing about science. Nothing about quarks or equations, zooplankton or phytoplankton. What she does know is magic. Not pretend stage magic, but real magic—casting spells, summoning spirits, and seeing visions. Her Grandma Ata was an Inuit shaman, and she had been teaching Imina her skills before she died. Imina is sure she can be a shaman, too, but without her grandmother, there’s no one to show her the way.
But now Imina lives in an underwater habitat with her family, a scientific lab where there is no tolerance for magic. Imina feels lost in the technological world of the habitat where no one, not even her parents, takes her magic seriously.
But someone is sabotaging the habitat and the generators that maintain their underwater world. Imina knows the damage is being caused by a magic-maker, and it’s up to her to stop the destruction. She has to use her shaman skills to save the habitat and prove that she’s not crazy—that magic does exist.
An exciting futuristic adventure with a mystical twist.”
Is it “Ocean Girl” by Peter Hepworth?
Accompanying their marine-biologist mother to a remote underwater research station, Jason and Brett meet the mysterious Neri and her humpback-whale friend, Charley, who must somehow be protected from the outside world.
I don’t know, but it sounds like a crazy riff on a film Tony Randall made in the late 60s; I watched it on UHF as an afternoon movie (if anyone remembers what that is): Hello Down There.
You know, I think it might be “Songs of Power!” The cover looks super familiar at any rate! I’ll definitely give it a download and see.
I read “Deep Wizardry” around the same as I read this book, actually, and I looovvedd it! So it’s definitely not that one, Olivia, but now I want to give that one a reread!
“Ocean Girl” sounds awesome too! Basically, I’m a sucker for anything involving underwater shenanigans, and it’s been driving me crazy that I can’t remember this book.
Thank you all so much, and thank you, Smart Bitches, for running this! 😀
I think it may be “Dark Life” by Kat Falls? But I read that book so many years ago that it’s only vaguely ringing bells in my mind.
I just love it when someone asks about a crazysauce scenario and there are multiple books offered as possibles. Who knew underwater science teen talks to whales was such a trope?
Also, I read the title as Heroine Lives in Underwater Situation and wondered how they got a romance out of flooded basements or mortgage debt.
‘Ocean Girl’ was an Australian TV series in the late 1990s and it was pretty wonderful. Although like all children’s TV shows at times it felt like it dragged on forever. It’s been a long time, but if I remember correctly it had interesting adult characters and a surprisingly complicated villain.
A google search turned up that you can get at least one of the series on iTunes.
Great thread! I also love underwater adventures, though still hoping there are more that are for the non-YA crowd.
I don’t think they’re your books, but it sounds a little like Madeline L’engle’s O’Keefe books 🙂 https://www.amazon.com/Arm-Starfish-OKeefe-Family-Book-ebook/dp/B007NNSS8I/ref=sr_1_7?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1466044357&sr=1-7&keywords=madeline+l%27engle+books
Oh man, the Madeline Le’Engle books were some of my favorite! I loved her as a teenager.
Dianna, ‘Ocean Girl’ was actually something my boyf mentioned when I was trying to figure this book out! That and ‘SeaLab 2020,’ which was on Netflix for a while I believe, and is decidedly not YA.
Demi, if you want something that’s underwater-y and not YA, you might try the Jane True series? It’s about a woman who’s part Selkie! I also read one once about a fallen angel who took the form of a horrible half octopus woman, but that was more crazysauce!
Lara, that is definitely not the book but I also just definitely bought it because it sounds AMAZING.
I cannot wait to read like, all of these underwater books, lol. 😀