ULTRAMARINE, translated novella that punches way above its weight in impact

ULTRAMARINE
MARIETTE NAVARRO (tr. Eve Hill-Agnus)
Deep Vellum
$17.95 all editions, available now

Rating: 4.5* of five

The Publisher Says: A female captain in a male-dominated field, the unnamed narrator of Ultramarine has secured her success through strict adherence to protocol; she now manages a crew of twenty men and helms her own vessel. Uncharacteristically, one day, she allows her crew to cut the engines and swim in the deep open water. Returning from this moment of leisure, the crew of mariners no longer totals twenty men: now, they are twenty-one.

Sparse and psychological, Ultramarine grips the reader in a tussle with reality, its rhythmic language mimicking the rocking of the boat. As instruments fail, weather reports contradict the senses, and the ship’s navigation mechanisms break down, Navarro “lulls her readers into accepting the unacceptable” (Asymptote) through deft, lyrical prose and pared-down dialogue. In Eve Hill-Agnus's poetic translation, Mariette Navarro emerges as an exciting, mature voice in French literature.

I RECEIVED A DRC FROM THE PUBLISHER VIA EDELWEISS+. THANK YOU.

My Review: Men led by a woman...really, that right there is subversive enough for one book, isn't it...get an unexpected, uncharacteristic concession to play from Authority. This is odd, but it's nothing compared to what's on the way in this novella.

I'm calling it psychological horror, not suspense, because the point isn't to solve some riddle before A Bad Thing happens; it's about what unsettling things happening around, and to, you as a group, can elicit from the members of the group. I've labeled it "magical realism" as well because the odd things that happen aren't explained, aren't the point, and are very much not of this consensus reality.

The title is a real pleasure. "Ultramarin" in French means the shade of blue, as well as the French colonial possessions that the ship's heading out over the bright blue tropical sea to. It's the role of a cargo ship to serve capitalism's need to get people things to buy. In her sudden subversion of the great Goddess Capitalism's need for Things to arrive so Commerce may eventuate, what is the captain thinking? The market is not being centered in her actions! The men are, wisely, unsettled and even unnerved despite their request for the halt being honored. They have their swim in the blueness of the sea, turning slightly blue with the heat-leaching nature of oceans.

Then, as is usual when unsanctioned fun is had, the price comes due...the extra crewman who just...appears, the end of some perfectly calm weather that enabled their swim, the unraveling of their social order as they contend with the mounting pressures...there is a serious amonut of unease traveling among all the ship's company. In a very odd way they become a "company" in the non-commercial sense only when they are guilty of not serving the company they're employed by; and the captain, a true seafarer in her very bones, for the first time feels herself of the ship's company as the weirdness unfolds.

Fantastical, unsettling, and very very beautiful. Subversively reminds the characters and the reader that. as powerful a religion as Capitalism may be, it is less than nothing set against the power of the sea.

I recommend this very short read to all y'all. It would've gotten the full five had we not, in under 150pp, still had too many points of view and not all of them resolved.