This was a short story I discovered in one of the free book promotions I often take part in. It’s one of the best-written tales I’ve found via such a method. As a result, I went ahead and bought one of the author’s novels. (Review forthcoming.)

For an example of the prose, I liked the evocation in this sentence: “A sneer that could have been mistaken for a smile crawled across the bottom half of Mario’s face.”

The plot is in the title. A pair of German tourists in the Philippines take part in an evening scuba session. Things don’t go as planned.

I’ve never scubaed, but I’ve done some snorkeling. I have particular memories of an almost religious experience underwater in Honolulu’s Hanauma Bay, watching all sorts of strange fish wander past my visor. That was brought back by reading this story.

Somé of the events described are delightfully grisly.

The plot is straightforward, but that’s often the case in short stories—there’s not much time to set up expectations that can be defied.

You can currently grab the story here: https://books.bookfunnel.com/spookysummerreads/jdsaqp5ymd