Cover Image: Sea Wife

Sea Wife

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Member Reviews

"Sometimes you're fighting the current so hard & still barely moving. Other times you don't feel a thing, you just slip out to sea, like a leaf."

I can't write this review without first acknowledging the beautiful cover. I think I originally requested an arc of this book based on the cover alone. The cover is stunning. I could sit and stare at the cover for hours and not tire of imagining my life with this view.

Unfortunately, that's about as far as my good feelings for this book go. I ended up listening to this book now that it's been out for quite some time. It was very helpful to have two different narrators read the parts for Michael and Juliet. This helped differentiate the characters for me in a way I don't think the text would have, despite their stories being told with two different font styles. This book wasn't bad, per se, but I also didn't find myself particularly interested in what the characters were up to. I didn't care too much about Michael's captain log and I really didn't care about Juliet's life back on solid ground. There was a bit of a mystery worked into this story as well, but I just couldn't get myself to care enough about any of the characters to really get into the mystery.

This book is probably enjoyable for a certain population of readers, but it's not me. My opinion? Skip this one and find a book that will really give you joy in reading. This one? It's not it.

TW: discussion of childhood sexual abuse, death of a loved one, grief, depression

**Thank you to NetGalley and Knopf Publishing for an advanced reader's copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

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The buzz around this book made me nervous to read it but it lived up the hype! A unique concept and structure, I found this book hard to put down. The isolation of the sea paralleled my feeling of being trapped during the pandemic, which was oddly comforting. I'm always drawn to books that explore marriage, and this one did that extremely well. For fans of literary thrillers like The Current.

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I loved this book about families, marriage and life in general. Very well written and I would highly recommend.

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I want to thank NetGalley, the publisher and the author for giving me the opportunity to review this book. I admit in my joy at joining NetGalley I may have been overzealous in my requesting numbers. As this book has already been published, I am choosing to work on the current upcoming publish date books in my que. As I complete those I will work on my backlogged request and will provide a review at that time. I again send my sincere thanks and apologies.

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I adore books written in journal form and this one had enough to keep me going! It was a wonderful, bittersweet novel of decisions and their consequences. It was a book I could feel and it will stay with me a long time.

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You always read about people who do this incredible brave thing and walk away from their lives for a time. Me, I think I will stick with just reading the book. This was so we'll written, you can tell that Amity is a poet. It's a compulsive, engaging read full of deep thoughts and big adventure.

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It was fun to read a book that took me on a sea voyage during a time when none of us can really voyage anywhere. Despite being an interesting story, I wasn't really able to care about the characters or what happened to them. However, the writing is absolutely beautiful, and that makes this book worth reading.

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This book was incredibly well-written, remarkable prose (what else can you expect from a character narrative from a poet?) As you are reading, you do not know what to expect and the story keeps unfolding. What of this couple- will there be a disaster at sea? And once you find out that disaster is imminent, in what shape will it take? This book keeps you- hook, line and sinker.

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The Sea Wife is a prime example of beautiful prose. It is a gripping story yet one I would recommend to a small group of our best readers. It is a novel that will remain with me for a long time.
It was the basis for an enthusiastic discussion for our book club.

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I could not get into this book. The characters didn’t interest me and it seem like quite a rambling story.

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Thank you to Knoft and Netgalley for digital copy of SeaWife. Trying to resolve your marital problems while sailing around the Caribbean.
While I did enjoy Juliette and Michaels story , the ending was a let down

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The Sea Wife is a surprisingly unexpected novel, more the domestic drama of a marriage literally in choppy water than the "evil spouse" suspense that is all too common lately.

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"Marriages have failure points, just like boats, she said. You sail a boat through rough weather and the failure points are revealed, yes? Or would you rather not know?"

Ugh. This book. Some parts of it were very good and other parts of it are exactly the opposite of very good. So it's a solid 2.5 stars. Do I round up or down? I suppose I'm feeling generous as I'm mulling this book over, so 3 stars it is.

Sea Wife is a tale mostly told from two perspectives - one being from the Sea Wife herself, Juliet, in the present day and the other being from her husband, Michael, via his journal entries from their time aboard their sailboat aptly named the Juliet. When Juliet is struggling through debilitating bouts of depression and their marriage is crumbling, the pair decides the best way to remedy the situation is to purchase a sailboat and drag their two small children along for the year long (boat) ride.

As I do, I shall start with the good. Gaige's decision to use two primary narrators to tell the story via two different mediums - the captain's logs for Michael and just straight up storytelling for Juliet - plus throwing in a few (very cute) entries from their 7 year old daughter Sybil totally worked for a format to get the story across. I liked how it gave the reader an opportunity to see the same scenario through different lenses. I also thought Gaige did an excellent job of capturing the dynamic between Juliet and Michael. She painted this picture where you could see that this couple clearly still cared for each other but it was also apparent why they were struggling. As I was reading, I was on the fence if I thought this couple should stay together or go their separate ways. It's tough to write a story like this and not paint one character as the "bad guy" and the other as the "good guy," but Gaige succeeded at it.

Now for the bad. My biggest gripe with Sea Wife is that out of nowhere Gaige inserts politics into it. Clearly I did not read deeply enough into the description nor the reviews of this book before deciding to read it, because if I knew politics would come into play I never would have picked it up. The thing is, the political aspect was completely superfluous. Michael and Juliet had enough marital problems without it. So it makes no sense to me why Gaige decided to throw politics in the mix. My second grip was all of the sailing lingo. Jibs and jibes and tacking and leeward and starboard - who cares? Okay, okay dear reader you are correct to judge me for being being irritated about all of the sailing jargon in a book about sailing but it was still pages and pages of adjusting the boom nautical miles and blah blah blah and it was all I could do to not fall asleep while reading.

And that last chapter... I give Gaige credit for wrapping it up by adding a few more mediums into the mix including letters and an interview, but [all of the entries of Juliet's thesis where she's analyzing poetry to show the reader that she's back to working on her PhD were SO BORING. We get it! She's out of her depressive funk! But one truncated entry would have proven the point just as well.

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This book did not end up appealing to me and I didn't care for the ending. Thank you to Netgalley for this free ebook in exchange for an honest review.

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Absolutely loved this story. I felt like it was less of a thriller than the description made it appear to be, but the tension in the book more than made up for that. I couldn't put it down.

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Michael and Juliet follow his dream by buying a sailboat and taking off with their two young children on a year-long trip around the coastline of South America. It is a risky enterprise- only Michael has done even basic sailing before, their marriage has been shaky for some time, Juliet has struggled with depression and has been unable to complete her poetry dissertation while struggling as a wife and mother. They face big challenges but also discover a sense of freedom and closeness to the natural world which brings them closer together- until their world is turned upside down and changed irrevocably. This is a powerful and moving novel, told alternately by Juliet and through Michael’s diary in the boat’s logbook, so that we see events from the viewpoint of each. The wonders of the sea and the beauty of the remote islands are vividly brought to life, as the family experiences both a natural paradise and the terrors of being at the mercy of the elements. Juliet in particular is a complex character, blighted by a childhood encounter that has led to estrangement from her mother, burdened by domestic life and struggling within her marriage, yet against her better judgement she agrees to this incredible adventure and eventually finds a way forward. Recommended.

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In Amity Gaige’s new novel “Sea Wife,” Connecticut suburbanites Michael and Juliet have hit a rough spot in their marriage: he’s bored and restless at his corporate job, and she, dealing with two young children and recurring bouts of depression, has given up writing her dissertation on the poet Anne Sexton and resigned herself to life as a stay-at-home mom. Then Michael has an idea—what if they buy a sailboat and spend a year sailing the seas with their kids? Initially reluctant, Juliet eventually agrees; Michael buys a boat, rechristens it the “Juliet” and the family sets sail in the Caribbean—with tragic results.

Gaige, telling the story by alternating portions of Michael’s Captain’s Log with Juliet’s first person narrative (which in turn toggles between the family’s time at sea and the months after their return) reveals what the tragedy is fairly early. But by keeping the details of what actually happened concealed until the end of the book, Gaige ramps up the suspense and propels the novel toward its gripping conclusion.

A political undercurrent—Michael is a staunch Republican concerned that his liberties are being eroded and Juliet is a Democrat who doesn’t hide her disdain for his views—runs through the novel, which felt current but a bit unnecessary, and there is a late foray into detective fiction that seemed shoehorned in to give the novel an unneeded twist. But the passages when the “Juliet” is at sea, with their vivid descriptions of what life aboard a sailboat is like (in both smooth and stormy waters) were beautiful and visceral and interesting to me, and made “Sea Wife” a great beach reading choice.

Thank you to Knopf for providing me with an ARC of this title in return for my honest review.

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Gaige writes a book about marriage and poetry and politics with a beautiful prose. One of the narrators, Juliet, drags us into her grief, pulls us into the closet with her, while we untangle the journal left by her husband after their sailing trip through the Caribbean. The reader is left feeling gutted and emotional.

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I enjoyed this book. I liked the insight into marriage, loss, and life at sea. The ending wasn't my favorite, but a thoroughly enjoyed the story and glimpse into life at sea.

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Adventure, family, love, loss, secrets, death and intrigue. An intricately woven tale that is beautifully written.

** I received an electronic ARC from NetGalley in exchange for a fair and unbiased review of this book.

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