
The Boy from the Sea
A Novel
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Narrated by:
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Stanley Townsend
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By:
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Garrett Carr
About this listen
Set on Ireland’s west coast in the 1970s and 80s, a captivating debut novel about a baby boy who is discovered on the beach beside a small fishing town, as told by the locals who fall under the boy’s transfixing spell.
"Compassionate, lyrical and full of devilment."—Louise Kennedy, author of Trespasses
Ireland 1973, a baby boy is found on the beach of a close-knit fishing village. Fisherman Ambrose Bonnar offers to bring the child into his own family: his son, Declan, wife, Christine, and up the lane, Christine's sister and aging father. The townspeople remain fascinated by the baby, now named Brendan, as he grows into a strange yet charismatic young man.
The Boy from the Sea tells the story of a family and community, all thrown into turmoil by Brendan’s arrival. The family's fortunes rise and fall over the years—as do the town's, because nothing happens to one family here that doesn't happen to them all—as the forces of a voracious global economy and modernized commercial fishing wreak havoc on their way of life. In the village, Brendan and Declan are wildly different and often wildly at odds; out on the sea, Ambrose worries about his children, but cannot afford to tear his attention from the brutal work that keeps his family afloat. As the world around them keeps changing, the mystery of one boy’s origins pulls them all toward a surprising, stormy fate.
Both outrageously funny and incredibly moving, The Boy from the Sea is a dazzling novel from a major new voice in Irish literature.
©2025 Garrett Carr (P)2025 Random House AudioCritic reviews
"Carr’s novel accesses deep strands of truth by embedding magic in the real… In the difficulty of these characters’ lives is a sense of real connection that gives the book a kind of lightness, of what might be possible in a real community: lasting ties, genuine reciprocity. This is not false hope; it’s just hope… This is a surprising, tender and warm-hearted novel about a real place and real people.”—The Guardian
"A joy . . . vivid, loving and genuinely funny."—The Sunday Times
"The novel does something only art can, which is to show how more than one truth might be held in mind at once, even if together they conflict... Wry, observant, various and thoughtful, a book that gathers momentum like a westerly, the crash of consequences giving way to a late calm, the reader left with a stunned impression of the storm that just blew over."—The Irish Times
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By: Kate Folk
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The Edge of Water
- By: Olufunke Grace Bankole
- Narrated by: Nicole Cash
- Length: 8 hrs and 19 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall
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Performance
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Story
In Ibadan, Nigeria, a mother receives a divination that foretells danger for her daughter in America. In spite of this warning, she allows her to forge her own path, and Amina arrives in New Orleans filled with hope. But just as Amina begins to find her way, a hurricane threatens to destroy the city, upending everything she’d dreamed of and the lives of all she holds dear. Years later, her daughter is left with questions about the mother she barely knew, and the family she has yet to discover in Nigeria.
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Going Home
- A Novel
- By: Tom Lamont
- Narrated by: Jot Davies
- Length: 10 hrs and 29 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall
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Performance
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Story
Going Home is a sparkling, funny, bighearted story of family and what happens when three men—all of whom are completely ill-suited for fatherhood—take charge of a toddler following an unexpected loss.
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Great Story
- By E G Neufeld on 03-12-25
By: Tom Lamont
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Hunchback
- A Novel
- By: Saou Ichikawa
- Narrated by: Polly Barton, Yuriri Naka
- Length: 1 hr and 59 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall
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Performance
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Story
Born with a congenital muscle disorder, Shaka spends her days in her room in a care home outside Tokyo, relying on an electric wheelchair to get around and a ventilator to breathe. But if Shaka’s physical life is limited, her quick, mischievous mind has no boundaries: She takes e-learning courses on her iPad, publishes explicit fantasies on websites, and anonymously troll-tweets to see if anyone is paying attention (“In another life, I’d like to work as a high-class prostitute”). One day, she tweets into the void an offer of an enormous sum of money for a sperm donor.
By: Saou Ichikawa
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When the Harvest Comes
- A Novel
- By: Denne Michele Norris
- Narrated by: L Morgan Lee
- Length: 9 hrs
- Unabridged
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Overall
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Performance
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Story
The venerated Reverend Doctor John Freeman did not raise his son, Davis, to be touched by any man, let alone a white man. He did not raise his son to whisper that man’s name with tenderness. But on the eve of his wedding, all Davis can think about is how beautiful he wants to look when he meets his beloved Everett at the altar. Never mind that his mother, who died decades before, and his father, whose anger drove Davis to flee their home in Chagrin Falls, Ohio, for a freer life in New York City, won’t be there to walk him down the aisle.
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Killer Potential
- A Novel
- By: Hannah Deitch
- Narrated by: Kristen Sieh, Daru Oda
- Length: 9 hrs and 24 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall
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Performance
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Story
A scholarship kid with straight As and big dreams, Evie Gordon always thought she was special, that she’d be someone. But after graduating from an elite university, she finds herself drowning in debt and working as an SAT tutor for the super-rich of Los Angeles. Everything changes one Sunday, when she arrives for her weekly lesson at the Victors’ Beverly Hills estate and, in lieu of a bored teenager, finds the bloody remains of the parents strewn through their beautiful back garden, and a woman crying for help within a closet.
By: Hannah Deitch
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Nothing Serious
- A Novel
- By: Emily J. Smith
- Narrated by: Anna Caputo
- Length: 9 hrs and 19 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall
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Performance
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Story
Edie Walker’s life is not going as planned. At thirty-five, she feels stuck: in her career, in her love life, and in her tiny San Francisco studio apartment. It doesn’t help that her best friend, Peter Masterson, is basically the über successful male version of her—and she’s hopelessly, unrequitedly in love with him. But when Peter breaks up with his girlfriend of seven years, Edie thinks her life might finally be turning around. He’ll discover how toxic dating app culture is and realize that Edie has been right for him all along.
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Character development
- By Jason M. on 03-18-25
By: Emily J. Smith