If I told you one of my favorite books of the year is about a woman whose husband turns into a shark, would you think I’m crazy? Because this is, in fact, one bizarro premise — but try to hear me out.
“Shark Heart,” by Emily Habeck, is the weird and wonderful story of Lewis and Wren, two soulmates whose first year of marriage is also their last. When Lewis, a high school theater teacher, notices some strange things happening to his body, he heads to the doctor and receives a rare diagnosis: He’s transforming into a great white shark, and there is no cure.
Weird, right? Just stick with me.
Wren initially resists her husband’s fate, trying to find a way they can stay together after Lewis transforms. She invests in scuba gear. She looks into houseboats. She puts a pool in the backyard. Eventually, though, Lewis grows miserable on land — not to mention dangerous — and Wren has to grapple with how to let her husband go.
With nods to Kafka’s “Metamorphosis,” this debut novel is about so much more than its metaphor. Habeck’s quirky, almost experimental prose features some chapters that are only a paragraph long, and others that are just a sentence. Scattered among them are snippets of Lewis’s autobiographical play, childhood memories and conversations in list form. So the actual pages feature white space that hints at the vastness of an ocean. Oh, and there’s also a woman who’s pregnant with twin birds.
Revealing too much information about this novel would cheat you of a rare and remarkable experience. Just marvel at its gorgeous cover, and then open it and jump on in.
