---
product_id: 251867939
title: "When We Believed in Mermaids: A Novel"
price: "HK$205"
currency: HKD
in_stock: true
reviews_count: 5
url: https://www.desertcart.hk/products/251867939-when-we-believed-in-mermaids-a-novel
store_origin: HK
region: Hong Kong
---

# When We Believed in Mermaids: A Novel

**Price:** HK$205
**Availability:** ✅ In Stock

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- **What is this?** When We Believed in Mermaids: A Novel
- **How much does it cost?** HK$205 with free shipping
- **Is it available?** Yes, in stock and ready to ship
- **Where can I buy it?** [www.desertcart.hk](https://www.desertcart.hk/products/251867939-when-we-believed-in-mermaids-a-novel)

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- Customers looking for quality international products

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## Description

When We Believed in Mermaids: A Novel : O'Neal, Barbara: desertcart.ae: Books

Review: Loved it! We'll written characters, good pace and unexpected twists.
Review: “When We Believed in Mermaids an emotionally-charged story that explores the complexity of relationships, forgiveness and love opens when Kit Bianci journeys to Auckland, New Zealand to find her sister Josie Bianci thought dead for fifteen years. In her search, memories of the past surface not only reawakening the trauma of her childhood; their closeness to the lost teenage boy who adopted their family; but also of the love between the sisters until an incident changed Josie. With vivid description of Santa Cruz’s beaches where the sisters learned to surf to picturesque New Zealand where after fifteen years the sisters reunite the plot ignites with an emotional mix of grief, loss and anger. Well-written and flowing from the first page to the last, the story is told from both Kit and Josie’s perspectives as they each remember their lack of parental guidance; Dylan’s love and conscience care; the aftermath of a violent earthquake; and a train explosion that changed a life. Yet intertwined with the lies, grief and sadness in the sisters’ past there is a well of love between Josie (aka Mari Edwards)and her husband Simon as well the sparks that fly with Kit’s and Javier’s romance. Bringing the story to life are compelling and complex personalities like the clever and grounded doctor, Kit Bianci; beautiful, vulnerable Josie Bianci who pretended to die to be able to live again; the caring but broken Dylan; the talented and empathetic Javier; and the wealthy, loving Simon. I thoroughly enjoyed “When We Believed in Mermaids” a novel you can’t put down until finished.

## Technical Specifications

| Specification | Value |
|---------------|-------|
| Best Sellers Rank | #216,928 in Books ( See Top 100 in Books ) #2,481 in Women's Fiction #5,278 in Romance #7,550 in Contemporary Literature & Fiction |
| Customer reviews | 4.6 4.6 out of 5 stars (10,291) |
| Dimensions  | 13.97 x 2.54 x 20.96 cm |
| Edition  | Standard Edition |
| ISBN-10  | 1542004527 |
| ISBN-13  | 978-1542004527 |
| Item weight  | 1.05 Kilograms |
| Language  | English |
| Print length  | 352 pages |
| Publication date  | 16 July 2019 |
| Publisher  | Lake Union Publishing |

## Images

![When We Believed in Mermaids: A Novel - Image 1](https://m.media-amazon.com/images/I/41SD8WN7c2L.jpg)
![When We Believed in Mermaids: A Novel - Image 2](https://m.media-amazon.com/images/I/41ZetWS5QEL.jpg)
![When We Believed in Mermaids: A Novel - Image 3](https://m.media-amazon.com/images/I/41upRgW3ppL.jpg)
![When We Believed in Mermaids: A Novel - Image 4](https://m.media-amazon.com/images/I/51nFMCq++QL.jpg)
![When We Believed in Mermaids: A Novel - Image 5](https://m.media-amazon.com/images/I/61FFhUpWPRL.jpg)

## Customer Reviews

### ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ Review
*by A***R on 28 October 2020*

Loved it! We'll written characters, good pace and unexpected twists.

### ⭐⭐⭐⭐ Review
*by W***Y on 9 January 2021*

“When We Believed in Mermaids an emotionally-charged story that explores the complexity of relationships, forgiveness and love opens when Kit Bianci journeys to Auckland, New Zealand to find her sister Josie Bianci thought dead for fifteen years. In her search, memories of the past surface not only reawakening the trauma of her childhood; their closeness to the lost teenage boy who adopted their family; but also of the love between the sisters until an incident changed Josie. With vivid description of Santa Cruz’s beaches where the sisters learned to surf to picturesque New Zealand where after fifteen years the sisters reunite the plot ignites with an emotional mix of grief, loss and anger. Well-written and flowing from the first page to the last, the story is told from both Kit and Josie’s perspectives as they each remember their lack of parental guidance; Dylan’s love and conscience care; the aftermath of a violent earthquake; and a train explosion that changed a life. Yet intertwined with the lies, grief and sadness in the sisters’ past there is a well of love between Josie (aka Mari Edwards)and her husband Simon as well the sparks that fly with Kit’s and Javier’s romance. Bringing the story to life are compelling and complex personalities like the clever and grounded doctor, Kit Bianci; beautiful, vulnerable Josie Bianci who pretended to die to be able to live again; the caring but broken Dylan; the talented and empathetic Javier; and the wealthy, loving Simon. I thoroughly enjoyed “When We Believed in Mermaids” a novel you can’t put down until finished.

### ⭐⭐ Review
*by T***J on 23 May 2020*

To be fair, I've only read 70 pages of it before giving up. I usually don't, rather, I get intrigued in various sorts of stories fictional or not but this one never got me zoned. I would say a lot of the writing style got me off-put. It repeats so much of the same thing for the sake of sounding dramatic, rather than purposeful or telling a story. The thought-to-be-dead-but-alive sister, Josie, gets the credit of being both smart and doomed. But up to 70 pages, there's no evidence of her being intelligent. Nor doomed. And there was no evidence of strong sisterly love between Kit and Josie; we get fragments of childhood memories of the sisters but it's merely a description of events than Kit feeling emotions toward her family or her sister. All we know is things have changed. Perhaps tragically, but again, there really isn't much that Kit seems to feel. She only remembers. And all I thought was , "so?" Since the first 70 pages were mostly a poor build-up, the story progresses with the speed of a snail running up the walls of my house on a rainy day. And it was just as tiresome as watching the snail all day. Again, well, some people might find snail-watching entertaining, which is just fine, so I have nothing against people who find this entertaining. So in summary, the characters aren't well-drawn at all (honestly, I can't imagine any of their faces, what they might be wearing, how they might walk, how they might sound) and quite easily forgotten, overly dramatic without much substance to give a true impact on readers, while the story just doesn't develop and it's like reading a day-to-day diary of someone you just don't know and thus uninterested in. I've given it and additional star as I guess it's not fair to judge it completely after 70 pages of it, but then again, I just couldn't stand the superficial and writing of what seems to be wanna-be expert writer, unnecessarily describing furniture and the interior of a house in extensive detail with random New Zealand fun-facts here and there, that adds nothing to the story or the characters. I would recommend this if you would just read anything at all, but if you expect to get gripped with every page you go through, expect some substance and meaning with every paragraph(which I think IS the point of writing/reading a book) then this probably isn't for you.

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*Product available on Desertcart Hong Kong*
*Store origin: HK*
*Last updated: 2026-03-08*