Honestly, I was here thinking I am going to read the fast-paced mystery/thriller, based on the novel description. Wrong. This is a psychological story dealing with the different kinds of secrets, hurts and traumas of life from the various angles and various people, all of them somehow connected to young recovering addict Lacy.
I liked the well-described emotions and deep dvelve into the lives of the characters. The authoress definitely can do the emotions well. This is a slice of life as it is, raw, sometimes harsh, sometimes heavy and sad - and yet not without hope. Happy novel this is not - but it can make you reflect and ponder about what is really important in life and how we can survive its storms, when we are lost on our own personal sea (or the collective sea of bigger trauma). Autumn might be a good season for this kind of musings...

Compelling, character-driven novel that will capture the reader's heart. I loved all of the characters and getting to know them. There's an air of mystery with secrets hidden that keep you turning pages, but the setting and characters are what make this story shine.

Thank you Netgalley for allowing me to read this. Sadly the beginning was a very slow start but luckily picked up a few chapters in. This ended up being a beautiful book that I recommend!

"When beloved fisherman John Staybrook vanishes in the night, his loss stirs up more than grief. His daughter Ella is convinced he's still alive and vows to bring him home. But as she searches the small Massachusetts town, secrets throughout the community begin to bubble to the surface. As the pieces fall into place of what really happened, everyone from the babysitter to the local librarian are swept into a more urgent question: Why would someone go out in the middle of a deadly storm?"

Loss, love, grief and the undying effort to do the right thing are in the middle of this New England set story. This seaside, fishing village was the setting for a heartbreaking story of Ella and her search.

Despite a slow start, this book developed well. When a local fisherman is lost at sea, his family finds their small community has hidden secrets and breaks down as the tragedy evolves.

I received a free digital copy of this book from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

This book was hard to follow. It took me a while to get into it and things just never fully got explained. I kept thinking I was missing things, but they just simply were not there. I did really like how unique the story itself was. It just needed some refinement.

Thank you kindly to the author, the publisher, and NetGalley for this review copy.

Dislikes- It was hard to follow the characters and their relationships as they weren’t fully written out or explained. It almost felt like it was a sequel to another book. I thought at first I had skipped some pages. The book's storyline was difficult to follow and jumped from plot to plot. It had me saying “What? Why did it just give me two chapters on a different character and her mental illness and now it’s jumping to a little girl losing her father..” In the very end though, it added up. I would have although liked to see a different ending because it didn’t explain what happened to all the characters in full detail.

Likes- The main storyline is intriguing and unique and I really wanted to like this book! I’ve never read a fiction mystery were it’s based on men who go out to sea for their jobs and a local fisherman who goes missing. All the insight in the book through the fishing world and the strength/ stress it takes to be a fisherman or have a family member as a fisherman was learned personally through the author's own experiences. The book had a summery cape cod feeling to it and made me want to go to the beach. I enjoyed the tough independent woman who we're all the main characters in the book.

If you're looking for a read without many details in it to keep up with, then this is the book!
Triggers: Mental Illness, Drug abuse, adoption, loss

I really enjoyed another book by this author, The Fifteen Wonders of Daniel Green mostly for the uniqueness of the storyline. I saw this coming out and was intrigued enough to pick it up!

This title is symbolic in some ways, there is the actual sea, and the metaphorical one as people contemplate their roles in daily life. The actual sea is the life and blood of the small town, and a lot of families who depend on it are struggling to stay afloat (here in terms of finding enough money to go around). I was not sure how invested I was going to be partway into the narrative, there were many voices and a lot of different angles that we are watching the unfolding of events from. I will not talk about them all because the way they are woven together is part of its charm. There are numerous mentions and in-depth conversations about addictions and enablers here so that might be something that people should be aware of as they go in, in case it acts as a trigger.

We have one girl whose mind is rebelling against her, and she ended up in a hole she is valiantly but almost unsuccessfully trying to dig herself out of. There is another who has been handed lousy news but does not want it to be true. There are four(ish) grown women who are essential to the story, and they all have had ripple effects on each other and especially the girls in various ways. It was a different type of account, one of struggle and only mildly tinged with hope. I might have liked it even more if it had some probably improbable twists to make it happier, but that’s just me and my need to stay upbeat.

I recommend this to those who like reading books with relationships under a microscope and the fascinating nuances in them all.

I received an ARC thanks to NetGalley and the publishers, but the review is entirely based on my own reading experience.

In the small fishing village of Devil's Purse, John Staybrook is a well liked neighbor and respected local fisherman.
He goes out fishing in terrible weather conditions and is lost at sea.
His young daughter Ella doesn't believe he is dead. She heard her parents fighting earlier and she thinks her dad just wanted to get away from her mom.
She enlists the help of her teenage friend Lacey, to look for her dad.
Lacey has problems of her own. Suffering opioid addiction and anxiety, she is trying to remain sober, not wanting to once again disappoint her adoptive mother Maureen.
As they investigate, they begin stumbling onto the many secrets that their little town is hiding.
This emotional and moving story captivated me. The characters were engaging and appealing. Told with a quiet beauty that touched my heart.
Thank you Sourcebooks Landmark for the e-ARC via NetGalley.

An absolutely beautiful book!

Although the story takes a bit to get going, it ultimately becomes a great story that explores adoption; the lengths of a mother's love; addiction; and the depth of family commitment.

I would highly recommend this book! Thank you to Netgalley and the publisher for the ARC of this wonderful story!

Living in a small town everyone knows everyone else's business. There is no secret that can be kept quiet for long. Eventually it may not be gossiped about, but its known. The good thing is that there is a line of invisible support and in this small town it is more than most when fishermen's wives are left suddenly bereft with the loss of a husband.

The story revolves around the sudden disappearance of John Staybrook from his fishing boat and as to why he took the boat out in very difficult circumstances. His little daughter Ella refuses to accept that he is dead, believing he is still missing and somewhere out there waiting to be found. Apart from the basic heart break of sudden loss the story goes into many, many stories such as adoption, alcoholism, drug addiction, relationships, family ties.

It seemed overwhelming to be faced with many issues in one straight forward story but little by little the book settled into an easy reading pace and proved to be a good, interesting story.

Title: Lost at Sea
Author: Erica Boyce
Genre: Fiction
Rating: 4 out of 5

When fisherman John Staybrook vanishes one night during a storm, his disappearance raises questions. His daughter, Ella, is convinced he’s still alive and someone in the town is hiding secrets—and the key to his disappearance.

Her friend and former babysitter, Lacey, helps Ella investigate her father’s disappearance. Lacey is struggling with her own demons—her addition to painkillers after a knee injury, the “beetle” in her brain that makes her question everything around her and that’s only quieted by the pills—and secrets from her own past, but she and the rest of the town also wonder why an experienced fisherman like John was out in that deadly storm.

This novel, like Boyce’s previous novel, The Fifteen Wonders of Daniel Green, has a slow, easy pace that nevertheless keeps the reader intrigued to find out just what’s going on. So many secrets—and so few answers—keep that pace alive. Lacey’s struggle is at the heart of this novel, although Ella’s pain also holds a key place. With secrets from the past spilling over into the present, this novel manages to turn what seem to be random threads into a complex tapestry.

Erica Boyce is a member of the Massachusetts bar and an editor. Lost at Sea is her newest novel.

(Galley courtesy of Sourcebook Landmark in exchange for an honest review.)

A beautiful book, slow to start, with characters dispersed in the fishing town, hiding their deepest secrets. Until a fisherman John was lost at sea, the town and its members unraveled. The story dealt with the repercussions of losing a loved one and revealing the secrets.

My first book by author Erica Boyce, the story pulled me in one chapter at a time until I was completely immersed in its characters. The writing felt dismembered initially until the author craftily joined all the connections together. It soon felt I too was part of this rich tapestry.

The book was different than my thrillers, dealing with a lot of social issues, it still could make my pulse jump with its secrets. The characters complexed and flawed, wanting a good life, soon touched my heart with their light and dark shades. They were just so human. The story was character driven, the prose subtle in its poignancy, there was something quite deep as the sea in Erica's writing that I was lost in.

A delightful afternoon read.

Once a secret is unveiled it causes a chain reaction of other secrets you thought were hidden. Well told. Suspenful with plenty of twists and turns to keep you reading. Happy reading!

This is less about the loss of John, a fisherman, at sea than it is about the women in his life. The main focus is Lacey, a teen who becomes addicted to opioids first because of a knee injury and then to quiet the beetle in her brain. She was adopted as an infant by her mother Maureen, who has moved them to Devil's Purse so that Lacey can find, she hopes, her bio mom. This is also the story of Annie, the bio mom, and Rebecca, the town librarian who desperately wants a child. There's a twist you (like me) might see coming but I didn't see all of it. This is topical, emotional, and doesn't shy away from Lacey's problems. Boyce is a storyteller and I found myself swept in and carried away. Thanks to Netgalley for the ARC. An excellent read.

I received an ARC of this novel from Netgalley in exchange for an honest review.

A novel about a loss at sea, a loss into substance abuse, and the true meaning of family. Forgiveness reigns. I love this novel.

I want to start off by saying thank you for the opportunity to read and review this book, it was a very good read easy to follow along with storyline and characters. This was a new author for me but I very much enjoyed it, thank you for the opportunity and I look forward to reading more by this author again. I highly recommend this book to everybody.

I love a family drama in a remote small town so this was perfect for me! I felt like the prose was a little flowery but the characters were solid and there were enough secrets in the town to keep me occupied. The fact that it was a waterman lost at sea was a nice twist, I liked the seaside village aspect and it added to the mystery--surely he knew better than to set sail in that weather!

In a small fishing town called Devil’s Purse, a well-known fisherman and father goes missing while taking a tuna boat out on rough waters. Initially the focus of the story revolves around loss and each characters grief. What the synopsis doesn’t tell you is the focus shifts to a troubled teenage girl addicted to drugs with a troubling anxiety disorder. So trigger warning to readers who may not know what they signed up for with this book; it heavily tackles issues like drug and alcohol addiction, unwanted pregnancy and adoption. Lost at Sea is about a group of women who couldn’t be more different, but you hope all pull together for the greater good of how this story might end.

"She felt she could get up and dance on it when she realized the beetle was silent. In fact, when she prodded at the back of her mind, she realized it was gone. She no longer cared what the others thought or did or what they thought of her. It no longer mattered to her that Amanda and Chloe were being assholes, that she hadn’t started studying for finals yet, or that who-knows-what chemicals were being pumped through her body that very minute. It wasn’t like she always thought it would be: a sharp hit to her system and she was somebody else. Her body slipped into it easily, naturally, like this was how she was always supposed to be. She felt curiously warm and safer than she’d ever been. She felt gloriously, sparklingly fine."

I read Erica Boyce's The Fifteen Wonders of Daniel Green last year and loved it, so when I saw she had a new novel, I knew I wanted to read it. Just like the previous novel, what made this story magical for me was the character development. Similar to Daniel Green, this book started slowly. I wasn't sure who was who and how they were related. But just like the previous novel, it all came together.

Each of the characters in this story is textured, complicated, and real. They have their own stories and a series of experiences that led them here to be this person. They are 3-dimensional and rich and I couldn't help but get attached to them.

There are some surprises in the story but nothing that felt super twisty to me, nothing that distracted from the overall quiet but powerful nature of this story.

The depictions of anxiety are so vivid and so visual and so visceral in this story that I could both see and experience it as I read it. I loved this story as much as, if not more than the previous novel. I cannot wait to read more of Erica Boyce's stories.

With gratitude to netgalley and Sourcebooks Landmark for an early copy in exchange for an honest review.