11 exciting new SFF releases that will blow you away in March

The Deep – Alma Katsu

Alma Katsu’s 2018 novel The Hunger put a supernatural spin on the tragedy of the Donner Party, reimagining the story of the unfortunate settlers-turned-cannibals as a group of unfortunate souls being stalked and driven mad by a dark force. She aims, apparently, to do the same with the famous story of the H.M.S. Titanic with The Deep, turning its unfortunate sinking into a ghost story.

Technically, though, The Deep is the story of two shipwrecks – not just the Titanic, but its sister ship the Britannic as well. And that one you probably don’t know as well. Brittanic was one of the first ships to which changes were made in the wake of Titanic’s sinking. It ultimately became a wartime hospital ship before it, too, sank – victim of a German naval mine off the coast of Greece.

The Deep follows the story of Annie, an 18-year-old who must  flee her family’s home in Northern Ireland following a scandal. She winds up taking a job on the Titanic and later, the Britannic as well. Discovering how the story of Annie and these two ships – and the haunting presence that exists across both – fit together is half the fun of reading.

The official synopsis describes the story as follows.

"Someone, or something, is haunting the Titanic. This is the only way to explain the series of misfortunes that have plagued the passengers of the ship from the moment they set sail: mysterious disappearances, sudden deaths. Now suspended in an eerie, unsettling twilight zone during the four days of the liner’s illustrious maiden voyage, a number of the passengers – including millionaires Madeleine Astor and Benjamin Guggenheim, the maid Annie Hebbley and Mark Fletcher – are convinced that something sinister is going on . . . And then, as the world knows, disaster strikes. Years later and the world is at war. And a survivor of that fateful night, Annie, is working as a nurse on the sixth voyage of the Titanic’s sister ship, the Britannic, now refitted as a hospital ship. Plagued by the demons of her doomed first and near fatal journey across the Atlantic, Annie comes across an unconscious soldier she recognises while doing her rounds. It is the young man Mark. And she is convinced that he did not – could not – have survived the sinking of the Titanic..."

The Deep is available on March 10.