Our Wives Under The Sea
“What you have to understand," she says, "is that things can thrive in unimaginable conditions. All they need is the right sort of skin.”
Julia Armfield is one of my favourite authors of all time, so it's safe to say this post may be a teeny weeny bit biased.
The story begins when Leah, Miri's wife, returns from a deep sea expedition that went on months longer than originally planned, without explanation. And when Leah returns, it's clear to Miri that something isn't right. Like the sea can be calm on the surface and hide dark things beneath, this book takes us on an eery journey to the sea floor, to rock bottom, and up to the gentle bobbing waves of memory.
Our Wives Under The Sea is not my usual genre read; It's horror, and I don't like the be scared or grossed out. But what Julia Armfield does in this novel is something that I deeply enjoy no matter the genre: exploring the ways a relationship might be impacted by changing needs, wants, bodies, and perspectives. I love the building sense of something coming, of trusting that the author knows what they’re doing and is working toward something that will have me thinking about the story for months to come.
This novel is written in two POVs, Miri and Leah, the latter of which is not able to say much about the submarine incident that has left her fundamentally changed. Changing. It's an ongoing process, a low disintegration of flesh juxtaposed with scenes depicting their relationship before she left.
“Every couple, I think, enjoys its own mythology, recollections like note cards to guide you around an exhibition…”
The contrast between timelines makes for a deep meditation on grief and loss, a slow and worthwhile dive into the minds of two women who love each other more than anything while facing an inevitable, mysterious metamorphosis. It could be the queer-crip nerd in me, but it is easy to read as an allegory for dealing with the deterioration of one’s body and abilities, and the level of love the protagonists so clearly have is something that hits me right in the heart.
And this metamorphosis is not the only mystery—there's the agency who refuses to tell Miri the truth about what happened, who dodge her calls and do not account for anything. While this book isn't interested in giving us strict and explicit answers to these things, or even any answers at all, it is written in such a way as to render any explanations ultimately unimportant. What's done is done, and we're simply here for the ebb and flow, and sometimes the riptide, of a relationship that will never be the same.
Our Wives Under the Sea is a story that follows you long after you've finished it. Anticipatory grief clings like sand, yearning weighs the narrative down like a soaked shirt one does not want to change out of.