REVIEW: THE SEA GLASS COTTAGE, BY RAEANNE THAYNE

The life Olivia Harper always dreamed of isn’t so dreamy these days. The 16-hour work days are unfulfilling and so are things with her on-again, off-again boyfriend. But when she hears that her estranged mother, Juliet, has been seriously injured, Liv has no choice but to pack up her life and head home to beautiful Cape Sanctuary on the Northern California coast.

It’s just for a few months—that’s what Liv keeps telling herself. But the closer she gets to Cape Sanctuary, the painful memories start flooding back: Natalie, her vibrant, passionate older sister who downward-spiraled into addiction. The fights with her mother who enabled her sister at every turn. The overdose that took Natalie, leaving her now-teenaged daughter, Caitlin, an orphan.

As Liv tries to balance her own needs with those of her injured mother and an obstinate, resentful fifteen-year-old, it becomes clear that all three Harper women have been keeping heartbreaking secrets from one another. And as those secrets are revealed, Liv, Juliet, and Caitlin will see that it’s never too late—or too early—to heal family wounds and find forgiveness.

In the beginning of The Sea Glass Cottage, we meet Olivia, who has gone through a terrifying experience in her favorite Seattle coffee shop, and now is suffering a form of PTSD. Despite her issues, she changes her schedule to head to her hometown when her mother, Juliet, falls and seriously injures herself.As she tries to step in to help, she has to deal with her own feelings from her adolescence, when her mother focused all of her energy on her sister Natalie, an addict, and then on Caitlin, the baby her sister had back then. Now Caitlin is fifteen and full of barely suppressed rage about her own resentments and secrets.

It was hard to like Caitlin, who had done something she shouldn’t have, and is allowing what she learned to interfere with her relationships.

Juliet has her own secret, which is also an obstacle that could prevent future happiness.

I was rooting for Olivia throughout, but also hoping that Juliet and Caitlin would own up to their fears and secrets, allowing the family to rebuild. A 4.5 star read.

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