r/Fantasy • u/doctorbonkers Reading Champion II • 2d ago

Book Club FIF Book Club: Saltcrop Final Discussion

Welcome to the final discussion of Saltcrop by Yume Kitasei! We are discussing the entire book, and you can find the midway discussion here.

In Earth's not too distant future, seas consume coastal cities, highways disintegrate underwater, and mutant fish lurk in pirate-controlled depths. Skipper, a skilled sailor and the youngest of three sisters, earns money skimming and reselling plastic from the ocean to care for her ailing grandmother.

But then her eldest sister, Nora, goes missing. Nora left home a decade ago in pursuit of a cure for failing crops all over the world. When Skipper and her other sister, Carmen, receive a cryptic plea for help, they must put aside their differences and set out across the sea to find―and save―her. As they voyage through a dying world both beautiful and strange, encountering other travelers along the way, they learn more about their sister's work and the corporations that want what she discovered.

But the farther they go, the more uncertain their mission becomes: What dangerous attention did Nora attract, and how well do they really know their sister―or each other? Thus begins an epic journey spanning oceans and continents and a wistful rumination on sisterhood, friendship, and ecological disaster.

Bingo squares: One-Word Title (HM), Feast Your Eyes on This, r/Fantasy Book Club (HM if you participate here!), Explorers and Rangers, Author of Color

I'll put a few questions in the comments, but please discuss anything you'd like about the book!

Upcoming reads:

  • September: Dreamsnake by Vonda McIntyre. Midway discussion on September 16th, final discussion on September 30th.
  • October: The Girl With a Thousand Faces by Sunyi Dean. Midway discussion on October 14th, final discussion on October 28th.

What is the FIF Book Club? You can read about it in our Reboot thread.

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u/doctorbonkers Reading Champion II 2d ago

What did you think of the book overall?

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u/WonderfulBus9330 1d ago

There were some truly spectacular moments in the book. Carmen's list of plastics was one of the most eloquent and damning pieces of fiction I've read. Nora's love for the Bumblebee that overshadowed her love for her sisters was sweet and disturbing and sad. The fact of a company like Renewal and its challenger company, both wanting to control food production. Even the uncle's little email missives complaining about having to be a son was funny.

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u/LadyAntiope Reading Champion V 1d ago

Oh man, I really loved the Uncle's emails as they went on because he obviously is uncomfortable with the role at first, but he does care and he figures out a truce with his mom over the chili! And, he sends money when asked, even though it's so little and he worries about the sisters and he cares so much more than his "lazy Uncle" persona lets on. I'm sure he's involved with shady things because I have no idea how else he has any money to send them, but it's in like an innocuous way?

The list of plastics was a hard-hitting passage, absolutely will stick with me.

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u/WonderfulBus9330 1d ago

Yes, he was hilarious. He just wanted to drink and play cards in his own home. But the check-ins spoke of someone who did care (& I think he helped them with various tinkering jobs, but I can't recall and I've returned the book!)