Blue

Slack pacing mars this first novel, a fantasy about a boy who is, literally, a fish out of water. Morgan lives in a gray city with parents who are completely wrapped up in their own routines. After a talking marlin appears to Morgan in a dream, Morgan's transformation begins: he loves baths and develops a liking for anchovies, and scales begin to appear on his body. His parents rush him to the hospital, where doctors try to diagnose and cure him. Half-men, half-marlins rescue Morgan from the hospital (they stopped transforming because they ""stopped believing""). DeVita's cleverest moments center around these half-marlins: they often talk and move in unison, like a school of fish, and wear overcoats and hats to hide their marlin marks. But the author spends so much time setting up the premise describing Morgan's physical changes, the doctors' study of these changes, Morgan's escape and then his fish training that readers never get to empathize with the characters, much less immerse themselves in Morgan's experience. Ages 10-up. (Apr.)