A Literary Coastal Climate Novel of Resilience and Community
After Cossacks burn their home, ten-year-old Deborah and her father flee their shtetl to a remote island in Maine’s Penobscot Bay, seeking refuge and a new beginning. More than a century later, their descendants are once again uprooted—this time by climate change, rising seas, and a collapsing world.
As coastal towns disappear and families move inland, a new community forms: off-grid, tightly knit, and shaped by an unlikely alliance of islanders, relatives, and refugees. Through linked stories spanning generations, Sometimes an Island explores how people rebuild, remember, and endure in the face of upheaval.
Book Club Pick
Sometimes an Island is an ideal book club selection, offering rich themes of climate change, migration, resilience, and community. Its interconnected stories invite discussion about memory, identity, and how we respond to crisis—both personal and global.
A discussion guide is available to support deeper conversation.
Why readers love this book:
- A literary coastal climate novel spanning generations
- A powerful exploration of resilience, migration, and survival
- A windswept Maine setting shaped by rising seas
- Interconnected stories that build a rich, layered narrative
- Ideal for readers of literary fiction, eco-lit, and book club reads
Browse more literary coastal fiction from Sea Crow Press.
For readers who love:
- Literary climate fiction and eco-lit
- Multi-generational family sagas
- Coastal settings shaped by landscape and change
- Stories of migration, resilience, and community
- Interconnected or novel-in-stories structures
For readers of:
- The Overstory by Richard Powers
- Flight Behavior by Barbara Kingsolver
- Once There Were Wolves by Charlotte McConaghy
- The Light Between Oceans by M. L. Stedman
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