The Balize, Book One of the Inner Currents Trilogy by Theo Lemos, is a supernatural story sets in 1980s London, and revolves around the life of Zen. As the son of a prominent member of the London Greek shipping community, his parents had orchestrated his engagement to his childhood acquaintance, Sophia. The shipping business is experiencing a sudden decline. Therefore, Zen and Sophia are marrying each other for financial convenience, and I fully support Zen's decision to refuse such marriage. I'm quite disappointed with Sophia, who repudiates Zen's point of view. Their marriage would only benefit her more than Zen.

The supernatural element takes its time to fully materialize and move the plot. I'm usually impatient regarding this matter. However, the drama between the Greek shipping families was enough to keep me occupied. Lemos deftly describes the ins and outs of the shipping business, which further boosts the credibility of the story and, if I may say, is educational for readers like me who have no knowledge about it. I actually enjoyed the gradual unraveling of the mysterious being as Zen travels to the West Country to act as caretaker aboard one of the family's ships. It is supposed to be an opportunity to escape from all his troubles, yet he finds himself facing a sinister threat.

As the legendary being gets stronger and desires larger prey, it moves the plot faster and readers can look forward to some suspenseful and terrifying moments. This is my second read of Lemos’ work, and once again his deft prose delivers. I look forward to what Lemos has in store for the second book of the series.

The Balize (Inner Currents Book 1) by Theo Lemos is the story of Zen, who is not quite happy with how his life is going. His parents want him to marry a woman he does not love, and who does not love him, but both had initially thought their marriage would be convenient. When he decides not to marry her, the families are quite upset - after all, so much had already been organized, and even a holiday had been planned to celebrate! When one of the ships of his family's company needs to be tied up for who knows how long, Zen takes the chance and volunteers to live on the ship - a good escape from his troubles. But if he had known what waited for him, he might have made a different decision.

While The Balize (Inner Currents Book 1) by Theo Lemos did not exactly turn out to be the book I expected it to be (too much time was spent on events before Zen finally got to live on the ship), I did enjoy reading the story. When it comes to ships, I often am a bit sceptical because I know lots of authors write rubbish and you quickly understand that they've never spend a day of their lives on a boat. Theo Lemos, however, shows that he knows more than the average person, and it was delightful to read proper descriptions. I think this added a lot to the fact that you simply had to feel a bit unnerved the further the story progressed; it all felt quite "real". I would definitely recommend this book to people who like slightly supernatural stories that involve ships, and some interesting, well developed characters.