On her 20th birthday, Prima survives her father’s attempted murder-suicide. She then discovers a shocking possibility about herself; she may be partially non-human primate. Caught between heartless scientists and religious zealots, she submits to a DNA test. If the results are positive, she will need to decide to live as a freak, follow her father’s choice, or find another solution.
On her 20th birthday, Prima survives her father’s attempted murder-suicide. She then discovers a shocking possibility about herself; she may be partially non-human primate. Caught between heartless scientists and religious zealots, she submits to a DNA test. If the results are positive, she will need to decide to live as a freak, follow her father’s choice, or find another solution.
The ocean at the Concha Pointe pier is blue and beautiful, with gentle waves. That is how I remember it. Unless I cannot sleep—then, my memory is of a violent ocean, twisted green and black, hurtling itself into white spume on the barnacled pier pilings. In fragments of my dreams, it is only gray. Perhaps my shifting memories aren’t odd. The ocean, like a person, can be many things.
On my twentieth birthday, my parents took me to my favorite restaurant, The Pelican’s Roost, which sits at the entrance of the pier. From our balcony seats, I watched the sanderlings scooting at the water’s edge. Seagulls made piercing calls as they battled for scraps. Farther out, pelicans glided above the water.
As we sat there waiting to order, a surprising thing happened when my father’s phone rang.
Here we go again, I thought. He’ll be taking the call and rushing off without even having dinner with us.
Instead, I was astonished when he unclipped the phone from his belt and turned it off.
He said, “That'll take care of that. No more interruptions.”
I had never seen him not answer his phone, or at least not look at who was calling before ignoring it. I pinched the underside of my thigh to make sure I wasn’t dreaming.
As he placed his phone on the table, I looked at my mother. She arched her eyebrows high. Lifting them was no small feat considering all the fillers and Botox treatments she’d had on her forehead.
Rather than sit there with my mouth hanging open, I said, "Wow, Dad, don't you have important calls you might miss?"
"Maybe, but the only thing that matters right now is enjoying our meal for your birthday, Prima."
"Oh, right, of course. This is great," I said, stumbling for words. "I wish Garrett could have come. He really wanted to be here, but people can't live without having their pizzas delivered, apparently. His boss wouldn't let him off."
My father nodded and said, "Hmm. That's too bad, but just the three of us is nice."
"Maybe if you have time this weekend, he could come over. He wants to talk with you about something."
"That would be fine. I'm not planning on working this weekend."
My mother couldn't contain herself any longer.
"You're not going to be working?" she said, nearly choking on her words. "Don't you mean you're not going into the office?"
As long as I could remember, my father was always working. He was a fertility specialist MD who owned a group practice that served the aging affluent; people who had waited to have babies until the odds of conception were against them. It seemed that even when he supposedly wasn't working, he was taking calls or shuffling into his home office to take care of details that popped into his mind. At best, he was always preoccupied.
In the past few weeks, he'd been more distracted than usual. Kind of edgy and irritable.
My mother and I had a hand signal that we used to warn each other about his mood. When he wasn’t looking, we’d cup our hands in a C-shape, which stood for cranky. We’d been making the “C” a lot lately.
Suddenly, today his mood had shifted.
My father didn’t answer her. He simply looked out the window at the sky, and then down at his phone. I feared he might turn it on again if my mother started badgering him. I wanted him in a good mood for my birthday—and for when Garrett came over to see him.
“Robert,” my mother said. “Since when are you not working?”
I had to do something. I slipped the ring in my pocket onto my finger.
To distract her, I blurted out louder than I intended, “I have a surprise.”
It felt like every head in the restaurant turned in my direction.
My cheeks turned red—I don’t like being the center of attention. I took my hand out of my pocket and held it above the table. My mother grabbed my wrist and pulled my hand toward her to take a closer look.
"What a beautiful diamond,” she said appraisingly. “It has hints of blue. French cut, I believe, not your typical brilliant round.” My mother knew her diamonds. As an afterthought, she said, “This is an engagement ring.”
When she released my hand, I moved my hand over to my father. I doubted if he could tell one diamond from another.
"I assume that is why Garrett wants to see me? He must have delivered thousands of pizzas to buy it."
"Nope, it’s old. It belonged to his grandmother. Daddy, when you see him, you have to act surprised. He's kind of traditional. I promised him I'd keep it a secret until after he spoke with you.”
“I don’t think that will be a problem,” he said.
“You have to act surprised too, Mom.”
Reluctantly, I slipped the ring off and returned it to my pocket.
“Don't you think you're a little young?" my mother asked.
“No,” I said, bracing for an argument. When it didn’t come, I added, “Besides, we're not planning on getting married right away. Not until he finishes his bachelor’s. Now that he’ll be transferring to Stanford, he’s afraid I might meet someone while he’s away. He said the ring is an insurance policy."
My father laughed. My mother didn’t.
My father dipped his chin and peered at my mother from beneath pinched eyebrows.
"Did you know about this?" he asked. “Not that I’m surprised. They've been going together for over a year."
When my mother shook her head, he turned to me and said, "And how do I know he's good enough for my little girl?"
“He's going to be an investment banker. He's going to be rich. He's like you, Daddy. He's a straight A student, very mature, and he has plans to have his Master’s by the year 2000. Sometimes I think he’s ten years older than I am, not just one. He's even got a full scholarship. Actually, he got one B, but the teacher was unfair."
I started to rattle on about him. I could have talked about Garrett endlessly, but the waiter came to our table, which cut short my chattering.
The waiter’s name was Delphineaus. My mother always called him Del. He was from Costa Rica and it seemed that each time we saw him he became more feminine. He was passing and his latest transformation was breasts that jiggled under his puffy shirt. He took my mother's hand when he greeted her.
"You look absolutely radiant today. Just stunning. Your husband is a lucky man."
My mother might have blushed—it was hard to tell beneath her tan. Unlike me, she loves attention. She is the eternal seeker of the fountain of youth. Nothing much rattles her, except signs of aging. If my father weren't present, she'd have been swapping plastic surgeon stories with Del.
When my father isn't with us, Del calls my mom and me "sisters," which never fails to delight her.
Del extended his hand with formality and shook my father’s while telling him, "Dr. Otomo, it is such a pleasure to have you join us. We wish we saw you more often."
If my father found him odd, he didn't remark, but it was hard to tell with my father. He was a very contained man. I did notice that he slipped his hand under the table after the handshake, where I imagine he wiped it.
I was glad I'd slipped my ring back in my pocket by the time Del came to our table. Thankfully, my mom didn’t mention the big news to him. He'd have made a big fuss about it. I also felt a flash of relief that Garrett wasn’t with us for dinner. He isn’t tolerant of people he thinks of as different.
That's okay, I told myself because I planned on changing him for the better. Nobody's perfect. If we agreed on everything, it would be pretty dull.
While Del chatted with my parents, I watched the waves down on the beach, although I couldn't hear them through the windows or over the chatter and clatter of voices and dishes. My parents told me that, when I was little, I was afraid of the water. Once they finally got me in it, however, it was hard to get me out.
The surf was getting larger, but it was uneven and closing out this late in the day. Only two surfers in wetsuits were still in the water. People are often surprised at how cold the water is in Southern California, due to the Alaskan current. Their boards were too long for the beach break. I couldn't see their faces from this far away, but from their gestures they looked like they were having fun messing around and not minding that they weren't catching any real rides in the darkening water beside the pier.
When Del took our order, I pointed at the menu to indicate my choice of salmon. My mother told Del to bring a Cabernet Sauvignon for her and me.
Let me be honest here. Her ordering wine for me was a surprise. My parents were overprotective. Besides, I’m a teetotaler like my dad because I’m super sensitive to the effects of alcohol. Though, this time, I was glad she ordered it, because with my birthday and my big news, it might relax me.
He turned to me and said, "I'm sorry, I'll have to ask you for identification. It’s ridiculous, I know, but twenty-one is the legal drinking age in California."
I felt uncomfortable and avoided looking at him.
“What?" my mother protested, "My sister and I are the same age. You didn’t ask for my ID."
Without missing a beat, he said, "I've checked your identification before. It's hard to believe you’re over twenty-one, but as far as I can tell your driver’s license looks authentic." He winked at my mother.
"Sorry, I forgot my I.D.," I managed to say.
"Rules are terrible things sometimes,” he said, and slapped his pen on his notepad. “I won't be able to serve you any alcohol."
I shrugged. Then another thing happened at dinner that was unusual: my father ordered wine. My mother’s eyebrows arched again.
As Del was about to leave our table, Dad said, "Bring my daughter a cranberry juice in a wine glass, if you would, please."
I was about to object to the combination of salmon and cranberry juice, but noticed a little smile on my father’s face. Sure enough, when the drinks were delivered, he switched ours.
By the time we finished dinner, I'd had two glasses of wine.
I felt loopy. I pretended to enjoy the taste, but I'm not sure I like the way it makes my head feel, either. It’s weird, like things are happening around me faster than I can process them.
Maybe I inherited my father's aversion to alcohol, but I was proud that he was treating me like an adult.
I’m going to like being twenty.
This is one of the strangest and most fascinating books I’ve read in a while. Pier is part psychological drama, part speculative sci-fi, and part character study. It’s bold, unsettling, and surprisingly emotional in places.
Prima is such a compelling main character. From the opening pages, you’re thrown right into her trauma, surviving something incredibly dark on what should have been a milestone birthday. The story doesn’t shy away from that pain, and watching her try to make sense of her identity in the aftermath feels raw and real. Then, just when you think you know where it’s going, the book throws in a wild twist: she might not be entirely human.
That reveal could have easily gone off the rails, but the book handles it with a weird kind of seriousness that works. It raises questions about what it means to be human, how society treats people who are different, and how much of who we are comes from science versus belief. There are scientists who want to study her, religious groups that see her as something to be feared, and in the middle of it all is this young woman just trying to figure out how to survive.
The pacing is a bit uneven at times. Some sections feel intense and fast-moving, while others slow down and get a little lost in internal monologue. Still, the emotional core stays strong throughout. You really feel for Prima and the impossible situation she’s been thrown into.
Pier is a strange, thoughtful read that leaves you questioning everything by the end. It’s not your typical coming-of-age story, and that’s what makes it so memorable. If you like books that blur the line between science fiction and psychological drama, this one is worth checking out and I would definitely recommend even if you’re new to the genre.