Review: Hiro's Merman by Daisy Harris

Book Review: Hiro's Merman by Daisy Harris
Urban Merman 2

Following directly on from "Jamie's Merman" this one gives us the romance of one of Jamie's other three flatmates Hiro.

Timid selkie (merman) Deniz is the runt of his pod. He's a rua, the equivalent of a human albino, which means he has red hair and a tail like a Koi carp. Because of his freakish looks and natural submissive tendencies he is the prey of pod alpha Gai who rapes him on a regular basis. Deniz flees to the human world through a portal and instantly falls for half Hawaiian half Japanese, Hiro.

Hiro is a natural top and once he realises Deniz issues with penetrative sex wonders if he can make things work between them. Things finally start to work out when Gai turns up in the mortal world to get Deniz back...

My initial reaction is that this story is waaaaaaaaaaaaaay better than its predecessor. Thank you! Thank you!

Most of my criticisms of Jamie's merman still hold true here: Misuse of the word selkie, overuse of Christian names, things happening too fast and weird unexplained tail mechanism, Jamie being annoying...

However, the main characters are great. I loved the unusual look of Deniz with his beautiful red hair and fish tail. I liked the dynamic of a natural wanton who suffered trauma after being abused. Hiro wasn't quite so well developed, but sexy dominant Asian workaholic seemed enough to go on.

The plot is enjoyable too, rather simple but works for a novella. Things do move frustratingly fast - I think the whole story takes place within 24 hours and in that time our lovers have overcome all difficulties (such as rape trauma) and fallen madly in love. Plausible this isn't - I know that this is a story about gay mermen so realism isn't its strong point, but even so things happen way to fast.

Again I raise an eyebrow at the cover - Deniz is such a unique looking character with his long red hair that I'd love to see him done justice on the cover - which if it didn't have the word merman written on it I would take to be a contemporary city based gay romance. Still they do say never judge a book by its cover.

The sex is hot and we do get some sex toy play as Hiro takes his lover to a private bathhouse that caters to gay clientele. From a mer point of view the sex is not that interesting - tail splits and our merman gets legs. The tail remains attached at the waist and seems to act as I would imagine a monkey's tail might - which is confusing when in some scenes its described as a sari and has to be bunched at the waist.

Our couple seem perfectly suited to their roles and I did rather like the scene where Hiro loves Deniz so much he lets the merman top him but being naturally submissive, Deniz turns things round so that he can be dominated. The scene isn't given much emotional depth, but its still enjoyable.

In Hiro's merman we have a sexy merman erotic novel. The sex is hot, the merman has a tail, the story works and the two leads are pretty yummy. You could do much worse.

Verdict: 4/10