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It doesn’t matter if you believe in mermaids. She believes in you.
Gene is a rogue-for-hire, using his one-man ship to make a decent living on the flooded Earth. Most of the population has been driven out to Seaplexes–artificial islands glutted with poverty, commercialism, and organized crime. His AI companion, Stitch, does most of the work of their salvage and smuggling jobs. Life is good.
Until a mermaid crawls into his ship’s exhaust port.
Now it’s not enough for Gene to avoid the mafia he’s in debt to. Everyone’s wondering what this fantasy creature is doing on a dying planet. Corporations want to exploit her. Old friends want to capitalize on her fame. Gene has to choose between protecting her and keeping himself safe. And all she wants is to return home.
But the race back involves more than just mermaids. It includes a deviant scientist, a silver ship containing a rogue AI, and a “gray goo” device that could destroy all life on Earth.
Interviews and Reviews for Merm-8

Mags the Book Worm’s Review
Trips Down Imagination Road Review
Merm-8 Soundtrack

- Sting – If I Ever Lose My Faith In You
- Lifehouse – Halfway Gone
- Carolina Liar – I’m Not Over
- Fall Out Boy – This Ain’t a Scene, It’s an Arms Race
- Closure – Look Out Below
- Audioslave – Original Fire
- Basement Jaxx – Rendez-Vu
- The Pussycat Dolls – I Hate This Part
- Jonathan Coulton – I Crush Everything
- Metallica – Astronomy
- Foo Fighters – Let It Die
- Killed By Design – I Want the World
- Live – The Dolphins Cry
- Blue Stahli – Kill Me Every Time (Hypnotic Mix)
- Embassy – Gravity
- Natalie Imbruglia – Sunlight
- Synchronoize – Sweet Times O’ Mine (Guns ‘N Roses vs. Foo Fighters mash-up)
Further Reading
NON-FICTION
- Aquatic Ape: Fact or Fiction?, The, Souvenir Press, London, 1991. (Wikipedia)
- Biehn, All, Fluid Breathing, (2001)
- National Aquarium in Baltimore, “Fish Biology and Anatomy” (2001)
- Schickel, Katie, “Diving Underwater,” (7/5/01), Microsoft Encarta Online Encyclopedia 2001
- Sirenology & Haitian Art
- Wikipedia: Mermaid Problem
- Ocean Mysteries: “The Mermaids: Fact or Fantasy?”
- The Little Mermaid by Hans Christian Andersen (1836)
- The Little Mermaid (annotated) by Hans Christian Andersen
- “What If All the Ice Melts?” Myths and Realities by Wm. Robert Johnston
- The Mermaid Myth
- The Science of Superheroes by Lois H. Gresh and Robert Weinberg
FICTION
![]() | Blue Submarine No. 6 (1998) |
![]() | She Creature (2001) |
![]() | The Little Mermaid (a.k.a. Rusalochka) (1968) |
![]() | Night Tide (1961) |
- “Quartet, With Mermaids” by Alan Smale
- “A Tale From Captain Andy” by Ken Goldman
- “A Maid on the Shore” by Sonya Taaffe
- “Foam on the Water” by Cat Rambo
- “The Tale of the Innocent Little Mermaid Statue That Corrupted Many a Youth and Turned Many a Young Lady Into a Lesbian” by Megan Rose Gedris
- “The Fisherman and his Soul” by Oscar Wilde
- “The Mermaids’ Tea Party” by Samantha Henderson
- “How the Mermaid Lost Her Song” by Mark Teppo
- “The Mermaids Singing Each to Each” by Cat Rambo
- “A Journal of Certain Events of Scientific Interest from the First Survey Voyage of the Southern Waters by HMS Ocelot, As Observed by Professor Thaddeus Boswell, DPhil, MSc -or- A Lullaby” by Helen Keeble