Strange Horizons, September 11, 2017

“Watershed” by Allison Jamieson-Lucy

Reviewed by Victoria Silverwolf

Only two characters appear in “Watershed” by Allison Jamieson-Lucy. One is a woman who makes her living by using trained eels to catch fish from a river. The other is a woman who can walk on water. She can also control it, using its force to aid those who lack this ability. The price that those who have such magical skills must pay is a compulsion to journey down the river to the sea, presumably to die. (There are hints that this obsession is analogous to the life cycle of eels, who travel to the ocean to bear their young.) Although there is little surprising in this story, it is a quietly effective tale of friendship and loss.

Victoria Silverwolf does not fish.