...it was happening: the holiest of creative experiences, when two ingredients, the actor and character, combined to form a new substance entirely, one resembling nothing of its parent components. Lewis would enter the uncomplicated consciousness of a great white shark in extended flashes, desiring nothing but food and survival, and then return to himself, the human, with all his hopes, loves, dreams, and memories. [p. 72]
This is the story of Lewis (failed actor and enthusiastic high-school drama teacher) and his wife Wren, in their only year of marriage. Soon after the wedding, Lewis begins to suffer mysterious symptoms, and is eventually diagnosed 'with a mutation. Carcharodon carcharias'. He is turning into a great white shark: the mutation is rare, but not unheard of, and the process is irreversible. In parallel to his narration (some of which is presented in the form of a script), we see Wren's fear and determination. But not until the second part of the novel, which is the story of Wren's mother, do Lewis and Wren's stories begin to come together, to make something more than the sum of their parts.
This is a love story, and a novel about a world in which zoomorphic mutations (which have a genetic basis) afflict some small percentage of the population. The animals these people become are typically released into a 'placement' when their mutation completes. Before that, their animal instincts may overcome their human impulses. While Lewis is mourning the loss of colour as his eyes mutate, Wren is trying to negotiate life with a dangerous predator.
Which may be a metaphor.
And it's possible to read the mutations as metaphors for illness, especially the forms of illness that transform a person into something unknown and unknowing. But this beautiful novel (which I needed to read twice to fully appreciate) doesn't require interpretation. I think it will live in my head for a long time, and I shall follow the author's career (this is her first novel) with hope and fascination.
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