What I'm doing WRITE: WRANGLED

A boy warped beyond recognition. A girl who hunts sea creatures. A monster that brings them together. A world that tears them apart.

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Kharat alone watched the creature open his mouth and throw back his head. And she closed her eyes as pinpoints erupted from his neck, tiny dots of oxygen rising through the dark water like a million bursting clouds.

Marion O’Riley suffers a lightning strike aboard the Ironclad Fleetwood in 1879 that leaves him blind and disabled—but gives him the abilities to survive underwater in the Mid-Atlantic. It’s 500 years before Kharat Stockinhem, wrangler of sea monsters for the Department of Oceanic Threats in Scarborough, England, fishes him out. Kharat is on a mission to wrangle the Phantom, the world’s most notorious spook eel, with her father, Merk, and her grandfather, Ebenzer. But when the Stockinhems wrangle Marion instead, their mission changes. Suddenly, they’re responsible for a blond-haired blind “merboy” who’s forgotten how to speak and prefers whales to people.

Marion is much more comfortable with sea creatures. However, for the sake of staying alive in a century he didn’t know existed, Marion must trust the Stockinhems to protect him from the DOT. By keeping Marion hidden in a secret tarn, pretending to carry out their mission in the Atlantic and side-stepping the suspicious DOT Director Dult Klipper, the Stockinhems begin to unravel the circumstances of their assignment.

The Stockinhems begin to question what else is true about the mission, the DOT and the man spearheading the Phantom capture project. They must turn to others—especially fellow wrangler Terit Larkins—for answers. But they must also trust their instincts. Things turn dangerous when the DOT becomes aware of Marion’s existence. He is the missing link that might provide the blueprint for the agency's biggest discovery.

Kharat can’t let that happen, of course. When Merk and Ebenzer are captured and held for protecting Marion, it’s up to her to form a rescue team and take down the DOT. The dangerous coup is just what they need to expose the DOT, turning the tide against the agency and the marine engineers running it.