A story spanning three months' time in the life of a small coastal town called Dunnet Landing in nineteenth-century Maine. A lone female visitor arrives and finds lodging with the widowed Mrs. Todd, the town's herbalist, who introduces the visitor to many of the town's inhabitants. The visitor's impressions of the people she meets start out simply, and then almost invisibly they crescendo into a deep, intense human portrait.

Ruth Thomas returns from boarding school to join her family in their Maine island lobster fishing business which is in a age-old fishing feud with other local lobstermen.

The stories in this acclaimed debut all take place in the state of Maine-which quickly comes to stand for the state we're all in when we face the moments that change our lives forever. Two roughneck hockey players are kicked off the team and forced to join the drama club. A young bartender at a party of coastal aristocrats has to deal with the surreal request to put a rich old coot out of his misery. Can a father defend his family if the diver helping...

Portraits and scenes of the quiet life in a seaside village in Maine.

Feeling stuck in her personal life and career, thirty-three-year-old Angela pursues a seemingly idyllic online relationship with a sailing instructor from Maine, relocates there, and learns important truths about understanding her own heart in finding happiness.