This book was a wild gut-punch of a trip for me. Strange, a bit grotesque, poetic, extremely emotional, and very queer. Readers follow a pair of wives and their roller coaster of a relationship. Leah has returned, changed, after a disastrous submarine mission in which she and her cabinmates were trapped under the sea for months. After months of no communication, not knowing where Leah is or if she’s even alive, her wife, Miri, is supposed to return to business as usual. Between two POVs, we witness Leah’s experience of being trapped in a submarine with a small crew, and we watch as Miri attempts to process various stages and forms of grief while she’s gone and even once she’s back.

If you enjoy the nature-esque horror of VanderMeer’s “Annihilation” series and the dark, emotional prose of Machado’s “In the Dream House”, you will probably enjoy sinking your teeth into this novel. There are images of Miri and Leah imprinted on my brain that won’t be fading anytime soon. If her first novel is any indicator of talent and imaginative ideas, I can’t wait to see what else Armfield has in store for readers in the future.