Morgan is a quiet man who has recently broken up with his boyfriend James. Morgan is dealing with a number of life pressures and difficulties. His father passed away and his mother now has Alzheimer's and he has put her in a care home. He feels lonely and a bit lost. He is also haunted by troubling dreams about the wreck of the Troilus which was a ship which ran aground during a storm two hundred years ago.

Dominic Watson is researching local history and is keen to look at the beams in Morgan's house which are actually from the Troilus. When Morgan meets Dominic he decides to help him and allow him access to his home so that Dominic can do his research.

As the two men get to know each other Morgan is able to share with Dominic about his mother's dementia and about the ship that keeps haunting his dreams. Morgan finds that the pressures he is facing have made it difficult for him to form friendships or relationships. He is caught between his loss and the unwelcome developments in his life and whether he can rise above these difficulties and step into something new.

I initially thought this would be a ghost story of some kind and I was a bit disappointed to find out that it wasn't. Morgan was a difficult character to get into. He just had too much sadness and fear in his life and I was hoping that this would all build up to solving the mystery of the wreck and what happened. The guys end up together and Morgan seems to find answers to his fears about his health. I was left with questions about the ship, survivors and Mary. The writing is good but the story isn't what I was expecting.

Copy provided by Riptide Publications via Netgalley in exchange for an unbiased review.

This book was just not for me nor do I think this series is for me although I love the genre as well as the authors that write this series. I found this book to be surprisingly maudlin and not what I though I'd betting from Charlie Cochrane. I'll continue to read her because she's fantastic but this just wasn't for me.

I've really been enjoying the books in the Porthkennack series, but found this one a bit lacking. The chemistry between Morgan and Dominic never quite gelled for me.

I had a very difficult time reviewing this one. I really wanted to like it, and came away feeling “It's not you, it's me. Okay, a little bit you.”

Dominic Watson is trying to solve a mystery about the wreck of the Troilus, which most say ended with all hands lost, while some versions of the tale speak of a lone survivor. He seeks out Morgan Capell, who lives in a house made with timbers from the wreck, hoping he can find more information.

Morgan has just gone through a bad breakup, but we never actually see the ex-boyfriend, we just hear about him several times. He's even the one who told Dominic about the timbers in the house, which isn't widely known. Beyond the timbers, Morgan has another connection to the Troilus, which is a recurring nightmare of the wreck since he was a teenager. Combined with his mother's early onset dementia (and apparently her mother had dementia too), he's now convinced he's headed down the same path. I'm not clear how he makes this connection, because he thinks he's going mad because of the nightmares that started when he was a teen, which is a completely different thing than dementia, even if it was early onset.

There's a lot of lots of telling, not showing. I was actually rather intrigued by the “fade to black” sex scenes, with talk about the two having sex but not in great detail, which is unusual in most romances these days. The rest... well, I honestly can't see what these two have in common beyond the shipwreck one wants to learn more about while the other doesn't want to think about it because there's not much spent on developing the characters. We're told they're into each other, so they are.

Morgan is a bit of an ass to Dominic because of the break-up, nightmares, and his fear of dementia. The reader knows all this, and Dominic does to a certain extent, but I was left wondering why he stuck around when Morgan repeatedly lashed out. I can't say it's due to True Love, because they're not even in the vicinity of it as far as the words on the page tell us.

Meanwhile, Dominic wants to find out if there was a survivor of the wreck, because one story has it that he was killed by another crewman onboard, which can't be the case if he survived the wreck. I honestly can't remember if his research was due to pure curiosity or family history, but it doesn't matter, it's merely a MacGuffin to get him to Porthkennack, which he had visited with family for several years when he was a child. We don't get a lot of details about Dominic's life beyond he mostly lives in London, he's apparently well-off, and he's nostalgic about his childhood vacations.

I think a large part of my problem with this one were the expectations set up by the blurb, and the book felt like something only vaguely similar. It sounds like there's going to be a hint of paranormal elements, but the author quickly discards that as “rubbish”, which is fine, but the resolution for why Morgan has been having dreams of the wreck is rather lame. It also leads to the missing piece of the puzzle about the fate of the possible survivor, then leaves it feeling unfinished with yet another clue to chase after.

I'm still interested in happenings in the fictional Porthkennack, but I'm afraid this particular book (or possibly the author, as this is my first one by her) just didn't work for me. It's not horrible, but it just didn't pull me in at all, and what did interest me ended up not being featured elements.

ARC provided by NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

Since the blurb does such a great job of describing the basic plot of Broke Deep, I won’t waste words on a rehash of events, but I will say that there’s a lot to like about this installment in the Porthkennack series, thanks to Charlie Cochrane’s proficiency at telling a solid story with likeable characters, and setting the stage with plenty of local flavor.

Broke Deep is a slow-burn romance, with its share of ups and downs, beginning as a burgeoning friendship, and running alongside the mystery of a long-ago shipwreck off the Cornwall coast that Dominic is researching because of the suspicion that one of the crewmen survived only, perhaps, to be murdered later in a crime of passion. I loved the sense of comradery that built between Morgan and Dominic as Morgan revealed more about himself and his possible familial connection to the events surrounding the Troilus’s sinking as they sifted through local legend and tall tales, including a particular event that strikes fear in Morgan’s heart due, not it small part, to its eerie implausibility.

But where this story really resonated with me on a personal level is with Morgan’s mom, who suffers from dementia, and the reality of losing a parent by degrees—not to a slow death but to the slow ravages of memory loss and the unraveling of personality as well. Watching the rare moments of lucidity slip away before Morgan’s eyes was touching, and the helplessness and frustration so relatable to anyone who has lived through it, not to mention the always underlying concern that you can’t escape your gene pool.

One of the things I love about this author is that her characters are consummately English, whether she’s writing a historical or contemporary novel, and the dialogue tells the story as much as it reveals about her characters: their thoughts, feelings, and personalities. Morgan has just gone through a rather humiliating breakup, and is a bit on the prickly side at times, isn’t particularly looking for a rebound romance, not to mention everything he’s going through with his mother, and I liked how his moods highlighted Dominic’s presence as the more even keeled character; although, Morgan’s moods are understandably turbulent rather than gratuitous for the sake of added drama. These two men can be playful as well, and completely endearing as their connection is tested and, in the end, becomes stronger.

This being the third installment in the Porthkennack series, and the second I’ve read after Joanna Chambers’ The Gathering Storm, I can say that this is shaping up to be another successful Riptide collection of novels. Each book is written as a standalone within the -verse, and Broke Deep is reliable Charlie Cochrane in plot, prose, and characterization. This is a book that fans of the author should enjoy just fine.

Reviews by the Wicked Reads Review Team

Sarah – ☆☆☆
Once again, the Cornwall in this series is magical. I love the nearly mythical history of Porthkennack, the captivating folklore, and the tangled family trees. Saying that, I was underwhelmed by the story in this third book.

Firstly, the voices, the lifestyles, and the interests of the two main characters make Morgan and Dominic feel like two men in late middle age. I was thoroughly surprised when Dominic was described as being on the right side of thirty.

I’ve never encountered twentysomething men who wax lyrically about the merits of Waitrose soups. Dominic and Morgan have the same conversations as my seventy something mother-in-law. Their tasteful fade to grey relationship feels like something out of one of my mother-in-law’s romances – especially when sex is blushingly referred to as a ‘coupling.’ These two seemed almost asexual and both were far more interested in investigating an old shipwreck than they were in each other. They fit each other well, but their relationship really didn’t capture my interest.

I was initially excited by the shipwreck storyline and the hint of supernatural occurrences. However, this storyline ends up rambling in circles before limping to a somewhat unsatisfying conclusion.

The one storyline I did enjoy was Morgan’s relationship with his mother and his growing anxiety over his family history of dementia. The author treats the relationship between mother and son very sensitively and Morgan’s fears about his own future are explored in a thoughtful and empathetic manner.

I love the town of Porthkennack but this is definitely not my favourite story in the series.

I've read the first book (Wake Up Call), Broke Deep and the fourth book (House of Cards) in the Porthkennack series. I skipped the second book because it's historical. I don't hate historical, but the genre isn't one of my favorites, so I skipped A Gathering Storm. I may go back to the historical offerings in the series later, we'll see...

I almost grudgingly have to admit that out of the three books in this series I've read so far, Broke Deep is my least favorite. That doesn't mean that I didn't like Broke Deep, because I did. I also really like Charlie Cochrane's writing. I guess it had to do more with the fact that I didn't relate to Morgan and Dominic as easy as I did with the rest of the characters that have been introduced in the other books. Just a personal thing, so don't let that deter you. To be honest, it may have just been the fact that I wanted more to their story. It felt like there was still a little bit of mystery left at the end - both for the characters and the actual 'mystery.' *sigh*

Even though Morgan and Dominic weren't my favorite Porthkennack couple, I still enjoyed my time spent with them. Even though they hadn't known each other long, there was an easiness about them when they were together. I also enjoyed the silly banter that masked a nervousness on both sides. That nervousness came from Dominic's willingness to be there for Morgan and Morgan's unwillingness to allow Dominic to go through the pain of losing him bit by bit, like he did with his mother.

Each book in this series adds another layer to the community of Porthkennack, yet none of them are really connected by anything other than the actual location. There's also a hint of 'magic' centered around the town. Nothing blatant or even really alluded to other than the feeling that's created by a place bathed in local lure and kept alive by the generations of locals who've lived there for centuries. Given Morgan's vivid dreams of a historic shipwreck, I was kind of hoping for some 'real' ghosts in Broke Deep, but they only seemed to inhabit his dreams. Again, just me... I'm a sucker for a good ghost story. ;)

House of Cards by Garrett Leigh is next in the Porthkennack series and I'll be reviewing it shortly, so stay tuned!

I didn't love Broke Deep, but I liked it better than many GR readers apparently. Is it exciting and action-packed and full of angsty passion? No, but that's not why I read Charlie Cochrane and that's not why I love her Cambridge Fellows series. I like her subtle, slyly clever, British approach to romance in which two people gradually glow closer as they find comfort and joy in each other's arms. Morgan and Dominic may not be able to hold a candle to the beloved Jonty and Orlando from Lessons in Love et al but they are still a sweet couple with a promising future.

Having said that, I do agree with several reviewers who complained that the mysteries about Morgan's dreams and the the sailor who may have survived the wreck of the Troilus were not resolved very satisfactorily, and in fact were not very engaging parts of the plot. However, I was happy to hang out with Morgan and Dominic as they took endless pots of tea together and walked the beaches of the fictional but lovely Porthkennack.

Rating: 3 stars out of 5

A Porthkennack novel

Morgan Capell’s life is falling apart by small degrees—his father’s dead, his boyfriend dumped him, and his mother’s in the grip of dementia. His state of mind isn’t helped by his all-too-real recurring nightmare of the wreck of the Troilus, a two hundred year old ship he’s been dreaming about since his teenage years.

The story of the Troilus is interwoven with the Capell family history. When amateur historian Dominic Watson inveigles himself into seeing the ship’s timbers which make up part of Morgan’s home, they form a tentative but prickly friendship that keeps threatening to spark into something more romantic.

Unexpectedly, Dominic discovers that one of the Troilus’s midshipman was rescued but subsequently might have been murdered, and persuades Morgan to help him establish the truth. But the more they dig, the more vivid Morgan’s nightmares become, until he’s convinced he’s showing the first signs of dementia. It takes as much patience as Dominic possesses—and a fortuitous discovery in a loft—to bring light out of the darkness.

I'm such a huge fan of Charlie Cochrane that I rush to pick up anything she writes and this sounded full of elements she could put her unique spin on.  It had historical aspects up the wazoo!  A wreck of the Troilus on the Cornish coast that seems to haunt this one family and village.  So modern times and the past combined, plus a romance between two unique spirits (something Cochrane thrives at - see Jonty and Orlando) and this ought to have been a smash hit.  But after I finished reading it, even the clever parts, I was left feeling a bit let down.  That's so unusual after one of her stories.  And I've been trying to figure out why.

I think it all comes down to a build up that never happens.  It all centers around that unlucky frigate the Troilus and the Capell family.  Cochrane builds up the suspense of what exactly is happening to Morgan (his headaches, nightmares, etc), the dementia of his mother, the past dementia of his maternal line as the story continues.  Dominic, a lovely character btw, adds to the tension with his disbelief yet need to further pull Morgan into more investigations into past history of the wreck and the dead...making things worse.  Things ramp up....until...violins at a pitch ala Hitchcock style...Cochrane then proceeds to narratively undo everything she's just accomplished.

To say I was astonished was putting it nicely.

What Cochrane did was clever.  But not satisfying.  I went 'huh, so that's it?'.  Utterly disappointed and sort of sad.  And you're left sort of up in the air about Morgan in some matters.

So what to say about Broke Deep?  Its well written, clever certainly.  The village and setting comes alive in the story as does the people who live there as well as Morgan and Dominic.  The mystery needed to be better clarified and for me, I wish my original thoughts about the blurb had been the right ones.  On to the next Charlie Cochrane story!

Cover by: G.D. Leigh.  Dramatic and works for the  story.

I enjoyed this book set in the town of Porthkennack in Cornwall, one of a series by different authors, but I was expecting something different from the blurb. I thought there would be a paranormal element or we'd have a dual time narrative with another story unfolding in the past, but there was none of that. Not the author's fault, but having been set up with these expectations made the ending feel weak. However, I liked the characters who both seemed rather oldfashioned and quirky, and I found the romance between them endearing and believable.

Each of the books in the Porthkennack series share a common setting - the Cornish community of Porthkennack (although A Gathering Storm is set in the 1850's) - but are stand-alones. The blurb for Broke Deep intrigued me because it involves a two-hundred year old shipwreck and two contemporary men who work to solve the mystery.

Through most of Broke Deep, I admired the tightly constructed plot that gives us Morgan Capell who dreams of the wreck of the Troilus in graphic detail and fears he was losing his mind - a concern that is not wild fantasy given his 60 year-old mother is in a nursing home with dementia.

When amateur historian Dominic enters the picture, Morgan meets someone who may be able to help him figure out the dream that he, his mother and his grandmother all had in common, but also salve the wounds of his breakup with James. Morgan and Dominic's relationship is not built on hot steamy sex scenes and is more quirky than carnal. I adored the author's depiction:

"When they got to the bedroom and the big, firm bed, their big, firm, and desperate body parts made it plain the time was right to couple again" [...] "Dominic had suggested a safeword — bloody Milton Keynes again — if things became uncomfortable, but it hadn’t been needed."

The blurb drew me in ... but the blurb also reveals something Morgan and Dominic only figure out 3/4 of the way through the book (aarrgghh) and hints at perhaps a paranormal resolution to the story. I give Broke Deep 3.5 stars but feel the blurb ultimately did not do the book any favors.

I’ve been following this series to date and I was hoping for a really interesting paranormal story based on the blurb, or at least a good ghost story to chase away the chill on a stormy night, but this one fell short. Other readers may love it, but it just wasn’t my cuppa. I found the romance to be lukewarm at best, and in fact, at times I wasn’t even sure it was a romance. Just a little light sex between two older blokes who put their books down long enough to hop in bed together. What they do there remains a mystery since the sex wasn’t explicit. Normally, I don’t care about that, but I just felt that there was no excitement to either character, individually or as a couple, so I was hoping for a spark to be revealed in the bedroom.

Morgan Capell has been having vivid nightmares since his childhood about the Troilus, a ship that wrecked offshore from his quaint family home many generations ago. Some of the timbers from the original ship are support beams in his house and stories of the wreck have been handed down for generations, but he doesn’t understand why his dreams are so vivid. And now, after breaking up with his long-time boyfriend, the dreams are back in force. Add to that, his worries over his mother who has developed early onset dementia and the troubling issues are too much for him some days.

When he’s contacted by a man interested in learning more about the wreck and in seeing the timbers for himself, he’s not sure he should get involved, but eventually he decides it will be okay. Dominic has an interest in more than the beams though. He’s convinced one of the midshipmen escaped the wreck and washed ashore, only to be killed later by a scorned lover. Morgan agrees to help him investigate and the two develop a romance after a while—though neither admits it’s a real romance, and at times, it seemed as if it wasn’t. But they persevere in their investigations of the lost sailor and eventually the mystery is solved.

As I said earlier, this one is fairly mild and the mystery is not such a mystery after all. The romance turns out to be one of those slow-burn, you-fit-me-like-an-old-shoe sort of relationship, but the story is pretty long and by that point I really didn’t much care. This is not one I would recommend. It certainly can be read as a standalone as others in the series can be, so skipping this one won’t spoil the series since the only thing the stories have in common is the location.

~~3. 5 stars~~

Broke Deep is a part of Riptide Publishing’s Porthkennack Universe, a series of standalones by various authors all set in the same coastal town. This is my first book of the series but I certainly wouldn’t hesitate revisiting the world. I’d characterize Broke Deep as a gentle romance. The plot and romance has a rolling tempo, not rushed but not dragging either. Although it’s a contemporary romance set on the Cornish coast of England, the romance and characters have a bit of a historic quality to it that makes it a unique read.

The plot revolves around a famed shipwreck that crashed upon the shores of Porthkennack. Morgan is a resident of the town, living in a house that incorporated salvaged timbers from the ship. While researching the history of the ship, Dominic meets Morgan. Both men have a stately, genteel affect to their characters- preferring written correspondence, skirting the subjects of attraction and sex, and using a polished, proper dialogue. Rather than off-putting, it fits and makes envisioning Dominic and Morgan as a couple easy. The sex scenes are minimal and occur behind closed doors, which fits with the tone of the characters and plot. Though there’s minimal heat, it doesn’t diminish the obvious chemistry between the men. A main source of angst in the romance is Morgan’s uncertainty about pursuing a long-term relationship with Dominic. While I did wish Morgan would get out of his own way at times, the incessant worrying aligned with his personality, making it a frustrating but believable plot point. Overall I found this couple a bit quirky, but likable.

The mystery surrounding the shipwreck and one particular sailor drove the plot for me. I enjoyed seeing Dominic and Morgan piece the clues together. I found the final resolution a bit more subdued than I expected, but again that fits with the characters, pacing, and plot- so I wasn’t unsatisfied. I think readers looking for an escape or fans of both historical and contemporary romances will appreciate Broke Deep and the unique town of Porthkennack.

Broke Deep, A Porthkennack novel, Charlie Cochrane
Review from Jeannie Zelos book reviews

Genre:  Romance, LGBTQIA

I loved the first two Porthkennack novels, they're a group of stories by different authors about the small town of Porthkennack. Similar to Riptides Bluewater series which I love.
This series isn't fixed on a time though so the books can be contemporary as this one is or historical. Great idea right?
Sadly though this one was just an OK read for me. Its a shame as I've loved some of Charlie's other novels and went in to this with great expectations ;-) Maybe that's the problem, the book just didn't live up to my perhaps too high hopes. 

I found Morgan to be a bit of a selfish jerk when it came to Dominic. He was good to his mother, and that's tough, seeing a parent with dementia, but when it came to Dominic he was too ready to snap, to blame him, to push him aside. And Dominic's such a sweet guy, very eager to please, very mild mannered and inoffensive. 
To be fair they don't start off well, Morgan getting a call from him on the day he receives his Dear John letter from his ex, who gave Dom Morgan's number. Seems Dom knew he was an ex before Morgan...

Its such a slow burn romance that it feels to me that it never really starts. I can't feel that sizzle, the magic connection between them, just a getting together almost out of convenience. There are moments when there's something, when Morgan muses over Dom's smile, when Dom feels Morgan's eyes on him, but they're fleeting. 
The historical part was interesting, the way over the years tales get told, retold, embellished and the truth can become a thin thread in the story.

The dementia angle is very sad and felt very real, with his mum's actions being so genuine, and his fears that he could have spotted it sooner very accurate. We do worry about things like that, wonder if we could have done more for a loved one. 
Dementia is something that happens to too many people, and Morgan's fears about it being inherited, about his nightmares, about what is or could happen to him are very real.
I expected more of an ending though, I just felt it kind of fizzled out, I was expecting another chapter, at least some kind of resolution about the dementia fears but suddenly it was then end and I wasn't ready for it. 

Stars: Three, an interesting story but fell a bit short for me. 

ARC supplied for review purposes by Netgalley and Publishers

3 Stars

Broke Deep is part of Riptide Publishing's Porthkennack series and can be read as a standalone, since neither of the stories are connected between them.

Morgan has been dealing (poorly) with his father's sudden death, his mother's dementia and his fear he's heading that way, too, his nightmares and now to top it all, his boyfriend dumped him through a Dear John letter. When he gets a call from Dominic asking for information regarding the shipwreck of the Troilus (the same shipwreck featuring in Morgan's nightmares), he's not too sure about it all, especially since Dominic got Morgan's name from his rat of an ex. He poses a challenge to Dominic and when Dominic meets it, Morgan can't in good faith refuse to help him out.

Morgan and Dominic get along great when they meet in person and even if Morgan isn't looking to start a relationship so soon after finishing things off with James, Morgan and Dominic soon find themselves in one as they try to find answers to Dominic's research about the Troilus and especially one of their midshipmen. However, the ghost of his mother's illness and his recurring nightmares make Morgan take a backstep from letting anything develop between them.

I liked Dominic a lot, he was steadfast, reliable and truly seemed to want to help Morgan out. He also had a lot of patience, but near the end, he seemed a bit too forgiving for my taste. I would've wished he had a bit more of a backbone. I liked Morgan, but he tried my patience more than a few times. He was selfish and stubborn and while I understood some of his fear regarding the very real possibility of getting dementia, I don't think he went about it the right way.

The book is well-written, even if perhaps too formal for a contemporary romance, but I have to admit I was a bit disappointed. I thought the whole Troilus investigation was going to play a bigger part in the plot and in the end, I was sort of left hanging. There wasn't a sense of closure in regards to the research or Morgan's health issues. I don't mind that there was no sex or romance on page, but I would've liked to see more of a connection between the main characters. I hope the author will write a follow-up to this book so she'll tie those loose ends.

*** Copy provided to the reviewer via NetGalley for my reading pleasure, a review wasn't a requirement. ***

I loved the first two installments in the Porthkennack series, and I had high hopes for Broke Deep, especially since the premise sounded so fascinating - I'm a history student so the aspect of researching local and family history and shipwrecks was really something I looked forward to read about. However, Broke Deep didn't meet my expectations and I had hard time connecting with the characters, and overall I was quite disappointed with the story.

To me, the story and its characters felt quite one dimensional as there wasn't much to hold onto or to identify with. The beginning of the book was promising: there was some strong feelings as Morgan had just been dumped by his insensitive ex-boyfriend while he was still dealing with his mother's early dementia, and Dominic seemed really enthusiastic about the research of the shipwreck. However, from then on it was a downhill for me, because the ship and plot surrounding it got lost among the all the long heart to heart talks. And despite all those long conversations between Morgan and Dominic, the reader don't learn anything new about the characters, their past and aspirations beyond what the first chapters told. For example, Dominic's career choice was mentioned once and there wasn't really anything about his family or living situation, other than he was mainly living in London. All of that made the characters bland and they just lacked any personalities. Most prominent characteristic that Morgan had was that he was really selfish most of the time, and Dominic was way too forgiving. I just couldn't connect with either of the characters and it all just felt so bland, especially since even the romance lacked a lot of any sort of heat.

Broke Deep just didn't seem to go anywhere, and all the major things were left unsolved: the budding relationship, the shipwreck, Morgan's fears of dementia. There were also plenty of telling but not really showing how the characters felt. The story had a lot of potential because the premise was very interesting and even the beginning of the story had potential to be as good as the previous books in the series. In the end it just didn't work for me because by the end I just didn't care about the characters or the plot.

If you're into long heart to heart conversations and romance that's slow burn and doesn't really have any steamy scenes and you find the premise interesting, then Broke Deep might be for you. I just didn't click with the story. However, I can wholeheartedly recommend the two previous books (Wake Up Call and A Gathering Storm) in Porthkennack series.