I honestly didn’t know whether I could keep reading after the first few pages because goodness does this book start with a punch! However, I’m so glad that I did! This was a much deeper and emotional book than I was expecting from the cover, but it was one I found myself absolutely adoring. I laughed. I cried. I want to visit the Caribbean. Anna is such a relatable character. Float Plan is centered on her healing trip sailing aboard her boat - now only hers after her fiancé commits suicide before the book begins. She is not unrealistically healed and emotionally collected as many characters in books like this are. Instead she is a mess of hopeful, devastated, angry, and every emotion in between. And Keane, hired to help her after she quickly admits she can’t do her trip alone, is the perfect other half to her story. There is a lot to learn from these characters and I am exceptionally glad I didn’t put it down.

Trigger warning: suicide, grief

This book is both heartbreaking and uplifting. After Anna’s husband takes his own life she takes his boat out to complete the trip he planned but never got to take. Along the way she meets Keane and he comes aboard to help her sail to her destination. While there is a lovely romance at the heart of the story, the journey through grief and facing fear is what really stands out. Anna is so brave but has to step far outside her comfort zone to realize it for herself. I do not know anything about sailing so I was really interested in learning how the boat worked and imagining traveling to warm locations. Anna and Keane met some wonderful and eclectic characters along the way who really added to the story. I want to let people know about trigger warnings for suicide and grief but I also highly recommend this book!

Thanks to Trish Doller, St. Martin Press, and NetGalley for an ARC of this book in exchange for an honest review.

This was more emotional than I expected based on the cover. That’s not a complaint-just an observation.

Anna’s journey was gripping and emotional. She’s still grieving the loss of her fiance to suicide. This sailing journey is an attempt to push herself, but also doesn’t magically fix her. There are moments she’s fine and others when she breaks down. That felt very real based on my limited experience with death. This does have a romance, but I think this is more about Anna’s struggle.

Keane was a great romantic interest and friend. He is such a good guy who is so understanding. He has some of his own issues mainly dealing with a return to sailing after losing part of his leg. But, again, most of it is about Anna’s issues.

I did like the romance. I worried it would be a little rushed, but it wasn’t. Anna isn’t just rebounding. And the conflicts to the romance were pretty different.

This had a road trip vibe, but at sea. In retrospect that makes sense. I think road trip book lovers would really like this. I don’t understand all the boating and sailing terminology, but it felt natural in the story.

One last thing that’s pretty minor. Anna never says her fiance committed suicide or killed himself. Instead she says he died by suicide. I’ve seen a lot of conversation online in the last few years about how to talk about suicide. Ms. Doller seems to be aware of these conversations and I’m sure these small word choices will be appreciated.

I don’t know a tiller from a rudder. When we first started dating, my (now) husband tried to teach me how to sail and apparently I did something that could have capsized us and he yelled and me and that was the end of that.

But I loved Float Plan.

I’m a big fan of Trish Doller’s YA books, which are always rich with emotion and feature complicated female characters.

Just a quick warning: this book does discuss the death by suicide of a character who had been battling depression. If you have more questions on this I’d be happy to answer them!

SO, WHY DID I LOVE FLOAT PLAN?
First off, at the moment I’d rather be anywhere than inside the four walls of my apartment. And when I go outside, I’m just trudging through dirty snow. The idea of sailing around the sunny Caribbean was extremely appealing.

I also love books that feature characters on emotional journeys. After a year-long pandemic, a book about someone triumphing over a tough life experience sounded like exactly what I wanted to read.

Float Plan reminded me a bit like Wild by Cheryl Strayed. Like Wild, Float Plan is a book about a woman who, burdened with grief, attempts an ambitious and probably unwise outdoor challenge and learns a lot about herself while doing it. Both books do a great job of showing both the dangerous and healing elements of nature.

I was a tiny bit unsure about the book’s romance element, but I thought it was incorporated beautifully. Keane, the love interest, isn’t just a manic pixie dream boy, but a fully fleshed-out character with his own challenges and demons. He’s an experienced sailor who signs on as Anna’s co-captain and sailing teacher for reasons of his own.

The two of them sail around the Caribbean, Anna learns to sail, works through her grief, meets a bunch of fellow sailors, stands up for herself, and decides what her life going forward might look like.

My honest review is I loved it!

The first 1/4 of this book broke my heart and the rest of the book put it back together.

The heartbreak, Anna’s growth along her journey, Anna and Keane’s growing bond and the adventure of sailing around the world kept me hooked.

You will be hooked as well and will not be bored.

I highly recommend this book!

After hearing all of my book friends rave about how amazing Float Plan was, I knew I had to read it and I was not disappointed. Not only was the imagery of the islands amazing but the way Anna's grief handled was outstanding.

After the suicide of her fiance, Anna decides to take their boat and complete their sailing trip they had been planning for three years. After a near miss on the trip from Miami to Bimini she knows she needs help and here enters Keane. Now let me tell you how much I LOVED him. He was perfectly imperfect and the growth from friendship to love made my heart so happy.

Honestly the only thing wrong with this book is that it was so short and I wished it could go on forever. Oh and now all I want to do is go to the Caribbean.

I really loved this book. I’ve always enjoyed books that take place abroad and also ones that teach you things (as well as a great romance). I learned so much about sailing from this book, and enjoyed googling all of the locations that they visited. I loved that they started out as friends and the relationship developed from there. It seemed realistic that Anna could have become interested in Keane because of all of the time they spent together in close quarters as friends. This was a slow burn, but so well written and kept me interested and invested. I loved it!

I had a smile plastered on my face for the majority of this book. Plus, the author has the character not just stop in Puerto Rico, but go to my home team's baseball game: Cangrejeros de Santurce, baby! I read it in one sitting and have no regrets.

Both Anna and Keane are hoping to prove themselves. Anna wants to complete the journey her fiancee had mapped out for them, whereas Keane wants to prove that he lost a leg but not his sailing skills. Their relationship may have had a rocky start, but their mutual admiration and trust in each other results in finding more than what they bargained for at the end of their journey.

I thoroughly enjoyed this book by Trish Doller! It was emotional and heartwarming. I loved Anna and adored Keane. This was a beautiful story and I highly recommend it!

I love this one. Absolutely loved it. A quick, fun read, perfect for the beach. A sweet love story, combined with the story of a woman regaining her life back after she thought all was lost. I flew through it and loved every minute.

I will definitely want to get my hands on anything else by Trish Doller.

I received an ARC from NetGalley in exchange for my honest review.

Float Plan came across my radar in summer 2020. A blogger I've trusted for a long, long time (@greadsbooks on Instagram) talked about this great new book from Trish Doller she had beta read and absolutely loved. It was on NetGalley already so I requested it because it sounded SO GOOD. Fast forward to last weekend when I finally curled up with the book aaaaand...absolutely devoured it. Friends, I honestly can't think of a single thing I did not like about this novel.

Here's the book's description:
Heartbroken by the loss of her fiancé, adventurous Anna finds a second chance at love with an Irish sailor in this riveting, emotional romance.
After a reminder goes off for the Caribbean sailing trip Anna was supposed to take with her fiancé, she impulsively goes to sea in the sailboat he left her, intending to complete the voyage alone.
But after a treacherous night’s sail, she realizes she can’t do it by herself and hires Keane, a professional sailor, to help. Much like Anna, Keane is struggling with a very different future than the one he had planned. As romance rises with the tide, they discover that it’s never too late to chart a new course.
In Trish Doller’s unforgettable Float Plan, starting over doesn't mean letting go of your past, it means making room for your future.

The novel starts in a really dark space as it begins with Anna's fiance's suicide note. Now, I know the description doesn't get into that but I think it's important that people know upfront that someone dies by suicide in this book. And it's something that Anna has to deal with throughout the novel - that she was the one left behind, that she feels she wasn't good enough to keep Ben alive. It's tough to read and I'm privileged enough that I've never been in that kind of situation so it's important for those who may be triggered by suicide to know before going into this story. Doller makes sure to keep it real while also lightening the story as time passes. Anna's story isn't going to be everyone's story but I appreciated this small insight into how someone might deal with losing their loved one to suicide.

Now, you might be wondering how this book could also be a romance when Anna is reeling from the death of her fiance. Know that it's about ten months since his death. (I know there's no time limit on grief which, I think, is something at least one character says throughout this book.) She may think she's going on this trip because she wants to hold on tight to Ben's memory but she soon realizes - after many, many bumps in the, well, ocean - that maybe this trip was more of a way to find some peace and chart a new course (yep, I went there with the sailing puns). I don't think many authors could find a way to bring a character from deep grief to emerging from grief to finding a new partner as well as Doller did. She approaches it with kindness and compassion which you really feel while you're reading.

Anna is magnificent. She's lost, in so many ways (except literally - she does always know where she's going even if it's a bit of a rough go), but the reader can see the woman she can become through all the grief she's wrapped up in. She's smart and funny and strong and I would love to have a cocktail or two on the beach with her. And as for Keane? Hoo boy, I would love an Irishman on a boat. Don't tell my boyfriend. He was such a great hero - so layered and so kind. Their dynamic was perfection and I fell in love with them both.

I have never felt the urge to sail around anywhere for any length of time on a small sailboat but I found myself really intrigued, and a tad envious, of Anna and Keane's lifestyle as they took the boat around the islands. It was a nice bit of armchair travel to discover some new Caribbean islands right alongside Anna and also revisit a spot I've traveled to before, on a much bigger ship. There's a scene when they arrive in Nassau, Bahamas where I've been twice on two separate cruises. It was nice to be brought back to that moment of sailing into the harbour but also totally being called out for being a tourist by the characters. I am well aware I only saw what tourists see and really appreciated the viewpoints given by the characters in the book.

I hadn't read any of Trish Doller's work before so I came into Float Plan with no real expectations. I was completely blown away and was left feeling so pleased and full of all the warm and fuzzies after I finished the book. It was well-written and so, so enjoyable. I highly recommend everyone reads it! Seriously. Go buy a copy now!

About the author
TRISH DOLLER is the author of novels for teens and adults about love, life, and finding your place in the world. A former journalist and radio personality, Trish has written several YA novels, including the critically acclaimed Something Like Normal, as well as Float Plan, her adult women's fiction debut. When she's not writing, Trish loves sailing, traveling, and avoiding housework. She lives in southwest Florida with an opinionated herding dog and an ex-pirate.

For where to buy the book, click here.

Connect with the author
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*An egalley of this novel was provided by the publisher, St. Martins Press, via NetGalley in exchange for review consideration. All opinions are honest and my own.*

Actual rating: 4/5 stars

I think this book with to be absolutely perfect for somebody and while I really enjoyed it, it wasn't perfect for me.

I loved everything about the way grief was handled in this book. I personally have never dealt with a loss like the main character, but it also deals with the loss of a love. That is something so many people can relate to, and it just connected with me. The descriptions of Anna's emotions were just so raw and real. It really made me tear up at some points.

I also think disability was handled in here amazingly. I am not a disabled myself, but my dad is and while his disability is different from the character's he has a similar mentality. This book really showed how just because someone develops a disability doesn't mean their life is over or that they can't keep doing the things they love. It really hit me in a soft spot.

The themes in here were ones I needed to hear and that I have been experiencing myself lately, This book dove into how being alone is okay and while you may care for people and want them in your life, doesn't mean you need them. I'm not super into theme heavy books, but this one really connected with me.

The reasons I didn't love this book was because it was so short. I feel like the relationships and characters didn't have time to fully develop, so I didn't really feel attached to them. I like how the romance effected the main character, but I wasn't connected to it in a traditional sense. I feel like this would have been better for me if the romance was more developed, or it ended on a bit of a bitter-sweet note.

I would highly recommend this book because of the themes it covers, and I think a lot of people will connect with it like I did.

Thank you to St. Martin's Griffin, Trish Doller, and NetGalley for an ARC in exchange for an honest review.

This was an unexpected book. It is titled a romance, and as the blurb would have you know, Anna's wallowing in grief that she is unable to come to grips with. She makes one impulsive decision, but that changes everything. This makes it sound like a straightforward growth arc of a woman who learns to love again. The book, however, was a little darker than that. It deals with topics like suicide and depression in a manner befitting its severity and its impact on people's lives.
Anna does not herself understand the world, and the only thing she knows is that she wants to complete the unfulfilled plan to sail. During this impulsive plan, very realistic events threaten to send her scurrying back into her sad place. Here, fate and the fact that this is a romance novel intervenes. Help comes in a neutral guise, and for most of the rest of the book, it is all about how Anna rebuilds herself. The romance stays beneath the surface till almost the very end.
It was a surprisingly quick read, and I shed a tear or two with some scenes. I would definitely pick up another book by the author.

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

A lovely and sweet story, poignant and well written.
I liked the style of writing and the fleshed out characters.
It's the first book I read by this author and won't surely be the last.
Recommended.
Many thanks to the publisher and Netgalley for this ARC, all opinions are mine

This was such a super cute and fun read! It had such a fresh and endearing premise that draws the reader in right away!

Doller created such loveable characters in Anna and Keane and it was so intriguing to follow both of their journeys as they navigated through their tragic pasts and uncertain futures.

It was a feel-good romantic comedy read that was packed with a great balance of heartbreak and humour.

I adored the unique setting and atmosphere of being at sea which proved to be the perfect fictional escape! 💛

“Sometimes you have to loose your way to find what you’re looking for”

This was a really interesting take on a lot of elements I've never experienced, but in a way that was open for non-sailors to understand and grow to love the couple. The blurb sets up the premise well- we have two wounded people who are recovering from great traumas in their lives. It isn't really insta-love here, but a well-described slow falling on the part of the heroine for the man who isn't her savior, but a very good person who is there for her every minute of her recovery from tragedy. I enjoyed the descriptions of grieving as much as those of the sailing- I am lucky enough to have never experienced the former, and unlucky to have never tried the latter, but this book was written in such a way that readers like me can still be fully engaged in the story. It was clear how much Doller understood both- and it was really lovely writing, too. Four gorgeous sea-worthy stars. Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for the ARC in exchange for this unbiased review.

Trigger warnings: Suicide and depression.

As a romance reader, I don't like being tricked into reading women's fiction. That's not to say I don't like women's fiction, those have a time and place. But when I'm in the mood for romance, I want romance. Not a women's fiction with romantic elements.
The novel starts of pretty heavy, with Anna still mourning Ben, her fiancé who has committed suicide. We get his suicide note and even descriptions of how he did it, which can be quite triggering. Before Ben died, they had planned to sail the Caribbean together and when Anna gets a reminder on her phone, she impulsively embarks on the trip alone. She follows the route he had charted out for them, but after a few close calls, she resolves she cannot make the trip alone and hires Keane, a professional sailor, to help her. Keane is also struggling with his own demons as a very different future is unfolding before him from the one he had originally planned. As Anna and Keane sail together, they grow close in the small space aboard the boat. Will Anna heal from losing Ben? Will Keane be able to accept and want what lies ahead of him? Will they be able to rediscover themselves?
The story focus heavily on Anna, our point of view character, and her journey towards healing from loss, accepting it's okay to move on from Ben and rediscovering who she is now without him. It's clear she's suffering from depression and while it was realistic for her mention and discuss Ben throughout the novel, it became disheartening to read. That's not what I want in a romance.
As for Keane, we don't really get to see his character develop. He's just there, encouraging Anna, comforting Anna, saving Anna, teaching Anna. That's not to say I didn't like him. I did. He's so sweet and loveable, but I wished we got more depth where he was concerned. For example, he has a disability as he has prosthetic limb and while I liked the depiction, it felt very surface level.
I also felt the writing did a lot of telling instead of showing. Many of Anna and Keane's interactions suffered from this, breezing by if there weren't any dialogues to slow the pace down. It left me feeling disconnected from the characters, from their relationship.
So why did I rate this three stars instead of two?
I did enjoy the descriptions of sailing and the island hopping, it really made me feel like I was aboard the Alberg, surrounded by the blue ocean, under a bright sun during the day and a blanket of moon and stars at night or like I was exploring a tropical island and meeting other sailors or interacting with the locals. And once I finally accepted that this wasn't a romance novel, I found the emotional journey towards healing and acceptance that Anna makes was very realistic and well done. So if that's what you're looking for, I think you'll enjoy this book. I just didn't appreciate being deceived.

Please note: I received an advance digital copy of this book through NetGalley from St. Martin's Griffin in exchange for a honest review. This does not influence my opinions in any way.

For some reason I put off reading this one; what a mistake! Float Plan was a wonderful and emotional book about love and loss and finding yourself and what you need. Absolutely my favorite read so far this year!

This romance set aboard a sailboat on the Carribean Sea has so much heart beneath the surface. The way Trish Dollar wrote about grief, had me stopping to take note of her words multiple times. I adored Keane, the perfect Irish gentleman, and I'm a bit of a sucker for the forced proximity trope.

This was the perfect palate cleansing read for me with just the right amount of real depth. I really enjoyed the descriptions of sailing and the beautiful Carribean, since that's about as close as I can get to travelling south right now. If you're looking for a romance to usher in Spring, you absolutely must pick this one up.

Thank you @stmartinspress for #gifting me a copy of this book!

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ 4/5 Stars
🔥 1/5 Steam Rating

Anna sets off on a spur of the moment solo trip through the Caribbean when she realizes she in over her head. Keane steps up to help her on her voyage. Anna & Keane are both struggling with grief in their own way and unsure of what the future will hold. Throughout this journey, both come to terms with their grief and find love within one another’s arms.

What I enjoyed:
• I loved the grief that seeped through these pages, you could feel Anna’s struggle to cope after her fiancé’s death and how she found herself in the end
• I enjoyed the build up between Anna & Keane, it felt like a natural progression
• This was a slow build romance but still kept your attention
• I loved all of the information about the Caribbean (I’ll admit, I had no idea Trinidad was located before this book)
• This was a quick read and the chapters were a great length

What I wished was different:
• My only complaint was that the ending felt rushed. The first part of the book was set at great pace, I wish it would have continued all the way through

Overall, I thought that this was a great story to escape to when you’re in need of a tropical getaway but it’s just not in the card for you.