The Deep

Rivers Solomon · Daveed Diggs · William Hutson · Jonathan Snipes

Nov 2019 · Sold by Simon and Schuster

About this ebook

Octavia E. Butler meets Marvel’s Black Panther in The Deep, a story rich with Afrofuturism, folklore, and the power of memory, inspired by the Hugo Award–nominated song “The Deep” from Daveed Diggs’s rap group Clipping.

Yetu holds the memories for her people—water-dwelling descendants of pregnant African slave women thrown overboard by slave owners—who live idyllic lives in the deep. Their past, too traumatic to be remembered regularly is forgotten by everyone, save one—the historian. This demanding role has been bestowed on Yetu.

Yetu remembers for everyone, and the memories, painful and wonderful, traumatic and terrible and miraculous, are destroying her. And so, she flees to the surface escaping the memories, the expectations, and the responsibilities—and discovers a world her people left behind long ago.

Yetu will learn more than she ever expected about her own past—and about the future of her people. If they are all to survive, they’ll need to reclaim the memories, reclaim their identity—and own who they really are.

The Deep is “a tour de force reorientation of the storytelling gaze…a superb, multilayered work,” (Publishers Weekly, starred review) and a vividly original and uniquely affecting story inspired by a song produced by the rap group Clipping.

Ratings and reviews

Deft prose and a lavishly detailed premise frame a conversation about the value of history. This was my first experience with Rivers Solomon's writing, and I immediately fell in love with their striking yet lyrical prose, perfect for a novella that took its inspiration from a song. (I definitely recommend listening to that song, "The Deep" by Clipping. It's beautiful and a bit unsettling, which is a mood that Solomon transposed smoothly into print.) Deep under the ocean surface live communities of wajinru, the descendants of pregnant African women thrown overboard by slavers. Yetu is the historian of her community, burdened with the responsibility of preserving all the memories of her people while her fellows live carefree lives unaware of their people's tragic history. Once a year, Yetu leads the other wajinru through a ceremony in which she passes the memories to them for three days. Yetu struggles with her responsibilities; already prone to overstimulation by being around others of her kind, the added weight of generations of memories threatens her survival. The Deep is a master study in narrative conflict against antagonists outside the common "evil enemy" mold. Yetu struggles against society, nature, and against herself, stretched until she breaks before piecing herself back together and building a future for her people in the process. Besides the thrilling, fast-paced story of Yetu's journey of self-discovery, The Deep is packed with insightful commentary on real-life oppression both historically and in modern society. Since I'm not African-American, I don't feel it's my place to speak too much about this aspect of the novella; I recommend checking out this excellent video by The Artisan Geek for a bit more on this and a great overview of The Deep in general. I'll say, though, that Solomon explored the question of whether there's value in preserving a traumatic history really well through the medium of speculative fiction. This novella managed to cram an impressive amount of character development, plot, and even a tiny romance arc into just over one hundred pages without ever feeling rushed. The Deep is a gem of a story and Solomon's writing is spectacular. I recommend this to readers who like utopian and dystopian worlds, standout characterization, and happy endings in the face of seemingly insurmountable odds.

A very emotional but hard to understand story for me personally. The Deep by Rivers Solomon is about an African women who was a slave that was thrown overboard during a horrible slave trade. In the book the story shows how they went on to build an under water society of water-breathing descendents. Also in the story there was one character who held onto the memories of what happened and the burdens of it. Which must have been very hard on that character. The plot of this story was hard to get into and understand but could still tell how emotional it was for the character who had to carry around the memories and trauma of what happened. This must have been a very hard heavy burden to carry around. This story was very unique and unlike other stories I have read in the past. I personally love "mermaid" stories especially unique ones even if their on the harder level of understanding for me. I reccomend if you love stories with mermaids with a history.

This novella tells a story inspired by clipping.’s song “The Deep”. It is a myth about the Wajinru—water-dwelling descendants of pregnant African slave women that had been thrown overboard by slavers. While the women died in the ocean, their children were born as Wajinru. Yetu, the main character, is a Historian, tasked with all of the memories of Wajinru ancestors—including the horrors of how they came to be. The memories drive her mad with their sorrow, grief, and burden—all of which she carries alone save for annual ceremonies when she shares the memories with the others. The memories become more than she can bear and she flees her home and the memories and takes solace at the surface, where she is too far from home to be touched by any memories. There, she learns more about family, history, ancestry, and community than she ever could have through memories alone. This book was SO beautiful! It made beauty out of a violent and devastating past that isn’t far from true history. It was a truly unique story that was beautifully written with fantastic world building. I definitely recommend this book for fans of dark fantasy and/or mythology!

About the author

Rivers Solomon is the author of An Unkindness of Ghosts, and was a finalist for the John W. Campbell Award finalist for Best New Writer. They graduated from Stanford University with a degree in comparative studies in race and ethnicity and hold an MFA in fiction writing from the Michener Center for Writers. Though originally from the United States, they currently live in Cambridge, England, with their family. Find them on Twitter @CyborgYndroid.

Daveed Diggs is an actor, singer, producer, writer, and rapper. He is the vocalist of the experimental hip hop group Clipping. Diggs originated the role of Marquis de Lafayette/Thomas Jefferson in the 2015 musical Hamilton by Lin-Manuel Miranda which he won a Grammy and Tony for. He also cowrote, produced, and stars in the film Blindspotting. Find him on Twitter @DaveedDiggs.

William Hutson is a composer, known for Room 237 (2012), The Mayor (2017), and Ten Minutes Is Two Hours (2013). He is part of the rap group Clipping. Find him on Twitter @Clppng.

Jonathan Snipes is a composer and sound designer for film and theater living in Los Angeles. He occasionally teaches sound design in the theater department at UCLA, and is a member of the rap group Clipping. Find him at Jonat8han.com.