My Love, My Love: Or the Peasant Girl - Rosa Guy

Guy's tropical retelling of The Little Mermaid is the gorgeous, tragic love story of Desiree, a beautiful peasant girl who devotes herself to the aristocratic young man whose life she has saved. When his upper-class family feels that Desiree's skin is too dark for a boy destined for power and wealth, Desiree proves that she is willing to give everything for love.