Bride of the Sea by Eman Quotah is a poignant and absorbing novel that will resonate with readers who appreciate stories about identity, culture, and family, particularly those who are interested in exploring the complexities of immigration, interfaith relationships, and the struggles of finding one's place in the world.

I couldn't get through this title. It ended up not being for me, but I hope it finds a hope with other readers.

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for the ARC.

This novel alternates between the U.S. (mostly Ohio) and Saudi Arabia (mostly Jidda) from the 1970s to the early 21st century. It was interesting to read both the perspective a Saudi woman living in the U.S. and an American woman (of Saudi heritage) living in Saudi Arabia. This is a culture/country I don't know much about, so I appreciated those perspectives. Recommend to readers who want to learn about new (to them) places and those who enjoy family drama books.

Thank you @netgalley and @tin_house for this free ebook. Bride of the Sea is a sweeping family drama that spans two continents and four decades with the Gulf War, 9/11, and an ever-changing world as the back drop. Muneer and Saeedah have a fraught relationship that soon ends in divorce. Muneer moves back to Saudi Arabia, and Saeedah stays in the States with their daughter Hanadi. Over the years Saeedah makes a huge effort to be untraceable by Muneer and his AND her family. They change their names, their appearance, and their address several times. The effects of this abduction are felt within the family and across the years. Quotah weaves together a beautiful story with pain and regret and themes of family, religion, race, and immigration. It is powerful to think of the decisions you make as a parent, in the best interest of your child, and the effects of that in your child's life over the years. What choices would we make differently if we knew the effects they would have on our children later?

Divorce us a topic well explored within the world of white Christians but I feel like it’s so rarely talked about across other religions and ethnicities. I enjoyed that piece of the book but wished the pace was a bit faster.

Bride of the Sea is Eman Quotah's debut novel, and it was such an interesting read for me. The tale of Muneer and Saeedah takes place in Jiddah, a beautiful Saudi port city. Having grown up as neighbours, Muneer and Saeedah are friends to the extent permitted in Saudi Arabia. One night they escape a family wedding for an adventure, on a whim. That whim, lands them in serious trouble. Muneer was about to leave Saudi Arabia for Ohio for college, as a bachelor. Instead, he is forced to marry Saeedah, and he heads to Ohio married, and as it turns out, Saeedah is pregnant, and, their parents give them almost no financial support. Saeedah gives birth to a baby girl, whom they name Hanida. When Hanida is around two years old, Muneer and Saeeda's marriage finally ends. Muneer must return to Jiddah, because his father dies and the family at home needs him. He leaves Ohio and Saeedah and Hanadi, believing,(according to Saudi tradition), that Hanadi will come to live with him in Jiddah, when she is 4. But instead, Saeedah and Hanadi disappear and take on new identities. Muneer, with the financial help of his ex father in law, searches for Hanadi for years, always hoping he will be reunited with his beloved daughter.

The book then focuses on Hanadi, when she is 18 yo. Her mother lied to her all through her childhood, telling her her father left them and that he was dead. When Hanadi, who becomes Hannah, discovers Muneer is not dead, she decides to reconnect with her family in Jiddah because no matter how hard she tried to fit the American mould, it always eluded her. Once in Jiddah, (and Riyadh), she finds the family very loving and accepting of her. But again, its a battle to fit in- she looks the part but can not speak the language and knows little of the traditions.

This story continues and in total, it covers a time period of 40 years. Hannah, her mother and father, her grandparents and extended family (and Hannah's own eventual family), forever live with the damage caused by Saeedah (Sally), something Hannah could never forgive her for.

Bride of the Sea is an #ownvoices coming of age story. It is Eman Quotah's ode to Jiddah and the people of Jiddah. It is a at times, heart breaking story about a Saudi family, facing issues of identity and belonging. I really enjoyed reading it, and highly recommend it. Thank you #netgalley and Tin House publishers for my digital copy of the book in return for an honest review. #5stars.

Bride of the Sea is, at its core, a story of what it means to belong. The writing is beautiful and while the story moves slowly, it's a thoughtful and eloquent read. Recommended!

Hanadi is at a crossroads between family members, between countries and cultures. With her parents' split shortly after her birth, Hanadi grows up and comes to realize the divisions in her life and the impact those divisions have on her identity.

I'm not exactly sure how to characterize this book. It is about fraught family dynamics and long held secrets, and also about identity and how we take on and shed parts of our identities. Muneer and Saeedah are a married Saudi couple living in the US while expecting their first child. Their marriage is in shambles, and soon it disintegrates beyond repair. Fearing that the daughter, Hanadi, will be taken back to Saudi Arabia by her ex, Saeedah takes her and runs. They must hide out, change names, and never linger in one place too long. Meanwhile, Muneer is back in Saudi Arabia running his newspaper and continuously searching for leads on his missing daughter. He eventually marries again and has other children, but Hanadi is always on his mind. When Hanadi, now Hannah, is a young adult, an old family friend recognizes her and she and Muneer are reunited. When Hannah realizes her mother has been lying to her all her life, she stops speaking to her. But that doesn't mean Hannah runs joyously into her father's waiting arms. She spends some time in Jidda to meet both sides of her family, but not having been raised with the language or culture, she doesn't feel quite at home there either. There is no easy answer or explanation for any of the characters in the book. They all experience loss in the process of trying to hold what is dear to them close, and Quotah's gentle writing of this is what makes this book a good read.

While this moved slowly for me at times, this was a beautiful story with a lot of depth and fantastic character development. Anyone that has suffered a loss will find something to connect to and love here.

Bride of the Sea was an intriguing read through cultural challenges. When Muneer and Saeeda move to the US as newlyweds, they see a variety of challenges, including the fact that Saeeda is pregnant and Muneer is thinking divorce. As they divorce and begin to navigate raising their daughter from two continents, Saeeda becomes afraid that Muneer will take their daughter and makes drastic moves to prevent that from happening. The story follows their daughter through adulthood and through the struggles she faces as a result of her mother's decisions.

Bride of the Sea by Eman Quotah, is the story of a mismatched Saudi couple, Muneer and Saeedah, and their young daughter, Hanadi, all living in Ohio.

“He was that kind of child, one who stopped himself from doing things, who would rather observe. She was the kind of girl who scrambled up and didn’t think twice. No risk seemed to scare her; nothing changed her mind.”

Eventually, vast differences topple their marriage, but the question of who Hanadi will live with looms. In Saudi culture after age 7 it is customary for a child to live with his or her father. Saeedah cannot accept this. Instead, she vanishes with Hanadi. Despite detectives, money, and frequent trips between his home in Jidda and the U.S. Muneer can’t locate his daughter.

“Muneer slams his fist into a cushion. How does a father lose his daughter as though she were a pair of socks under a bed, a toothbrush left behind in a hotel? No one asks the question out loud but Muneer knows they think it, too.”

Halfway through, Bride of the Sea shifts from Muneer and Saeedah, to Hanadi, a young woman with a past she needs to reframe and a family she wants to know. Torn between the world she grew up in and the one she missed out on, Hanadi travels to Saudi Arabia on the cusp of the Iraq War. The cultural dichotomies Hanadi faces make this a truly unique and touching coming-of-age story.

“When the maître d’ speaks to her in Arabic, she feels herself blushing. Not knowing the language that is her birthright is a special kind of stupidity.”

At times, the story moved a little slowly for my taste, but throughout I appreciated the compassion debut author Eman Quotah showed all her characters. With tender prose, she deftly examined what being taken did to not only the life of Hanadi, but those of Muneer and Saeedah, too.

I was interested in the plot and the way it combined the story of a child kidnapped by one of her parents with the story of being an immigrant from Saudi Arabia. But the book was oddly lacking in drama because it moved through time at such a fast pace that it always felt like we were seeing people healing and moving on. There was an odd lack of complexity to Hannah's feelings.

BRIDE OF THE SEA is a stunning #ownvoices story following the saga of a family split apart. It deals with themes of family, connection, and identity. Young mother, Saeedah, runs away with her daughter in order to keep her from being sent to live with her father in Saudi Arabia. The rest of the book involves all of the family members dealing with that decision throughout the rest of their lives. My favorite parts were with adult Hannah coming to terms with who she is, and I wish the book had spent a little more time on that era.

If you like family dramas, stories that span long time periods, and stories told from different characters' perspectives, you'll enjoy this one.

Thank you NetGalley and TinHouse for the ARC in exchange for an honest review.

A sweeping story that spans four decades, Muneer and Saeedah, are newly married, but quickly realize that this is not working out. Muneer goes back to Saudi Arabia, and leaves his daughter with Saeedah back in Cleveland, Ohio. This brings us a story of a father in search of his daughter, when Saeedah takes off with their daughter, not to be heard from.

This is a very intricate story at times where many people are affected, not to say the least Hanadi (Hannah) the daughter of this former couple. This is not an easy story to tell and you will find yourself questioning what is right and what is wrong. This story culminates to an unexpected ending. Hannah, was quite special in this story, and I do not envy the decisions she had to make.

Thank you NetGalley and Tin House for an Advanced Reader’s Copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

A beautiful book that spans the globe and the decades of a relationship. It reminded me of A Place for Us and Stay With Me. I found the narrator shifts a great way to get a well rounded picture of this family. While you do not get the entire story, I really like how the reader get to dip in across with the different characters and get a feel for the characters life. And the comments on the current issues in the modern time period of the story are very striking.

Eman Quotah's debut novel "Bride of the Sea" is a heart-wrenching tale of loss. However, it's also about a father's determination to find his missing daughter in order that she may be reunited with her family in Saudi.

Although this story is a character study of Saeedah, Muneer and Hanadi as they navigate the after-effects of Hanadi's kidnapping, I felt from the outset that I was missing part of the picture. I couldn't understand why Saeedah and Muneer were on the verge of divorce. I also felt confusion about what exactly Saeedah was fearful of: Muneer forcing her to return to Saudi, losing her daughter or both. This is a difficult guessing game since readers aren't privy to Saeedah's motivation or reason(s) for taking Hanadi and hiding from Muneer, especially because the courtship and marriage portion of the story is told from Muneer's perspective. Had the beginning of the novel been told either from dual first person narratives (from Muneer and Saeedah's perspectives) or third person, I think that this initial confusion could have easily been avoided and created a smoother trajectory for the rest of the action and character development, or lack thereof, in the novel.

The issues that Hanadi faces about her cultural identity were my favourite part of this story. I could understand how her own experiences in the US and Saudi at times clashed, how a language barrier prevented her from speaking with her extended family members and how reverse culture shock is a very real experience that isn't highlighted enough in writing.

I enjoyed the slower pace of this story and when Quotah wrote of life in Saudi, I could feel my heart ache as it reminded me of my time living in the Gulf (Kuwait, Oman and Qatar). I would happily read Quotah's next publication.

Many thanks to NetGalley and Tin House Books for allowing me to review an ARC of this novel.

Overall, this was a good story with interesting characters.
A little slow at times, but overall it was good

I couldn’t put this book down and finished it only in 3 sittings and while I did enjoy it, I felt that it was lacking in some areas.

I really enjoyed the characters, they were unique and relatable. I related with Hanadi the most bc we both were born and raised in North America, daughters of migrants, and went through an identity crisis. I loved Quotah's prose and it wasn't confusing at all when we'd go from one POV to another. The plot itself was entertaining and left me questioning on what’s going to happen next and this is mostly why I could not put it down! I also relaly appreciated that the description of Saudi Arabia and the culture was pretty spot and it wasn't dramatized for non-Arab readers.

Because the story takes us through 5 decades, there is a lot that is going on! We are jumping from one year to another and sometimes there are gaps in between that just leaves us with lots of questions. Most chapters end in cliffhangers and then we’re provided with a sentence or two of what happened which I found a little frustrating because I just wanted to know more! I personally get a little too attached to characters so I sometimes need to know their every move. I also felt that the end years were rushed and I was hoping we could slow down to learn more about the main characters.

Overall, I did enjoy this book and do recommend it if you’re into familial relationships, culture-clashes, or immigration. I will be thinking of Hanadi for awhile and I really enjoyed the author’s writing so I will be keeping an eye out for future books!

A delightfully written fast-paced book about what it means to belong, to know loss, and to heal.
Shortly after the birth of his daughter, Muneer divorces his wife and returns to Saudi Arabia, leaving his former family behind in Cleveland. Afraid of losing her daughter to her husband as soon as she turns seven, Saeedah takes Hanadi and goes into hiding, keeping her away even as Muneer searches for her. Hanadi’s whole growing up is spent in hiding never staying anywhere to long. But when Hanadi comes of age, she finds herself straddling two very different lives, in Eman Quotah's Bride of the Sea.
I really enjoyed Hanadi’s story and her search for belonging. I was hoping for more of Saeedah, her reasons and her feelings fell a little short in my view. I would have loved for her and her daughter to also have more of a resolution in terms of Hanadi not just seeing what happened but also developing a view on her mother’s reasons.
The author did a wonderful job of setting the reader in Saudi Arabia and in the culture of the Saudi expat community.
The book delivers an intimate look at the bonds of love between parents and children, and heartbreak.

I thank NetGalley for access to a digital ARC, any opinion expressed is my own !
My review is live on Goodreads and will be out on Instagram as well, I will mention the book on its pub day 1/26 as well !