Praised by the likes of Joseph O'Connor and Sarah Moss, and featuring highly on many 2025 Books of the Year lists (including The Observer and The Times), Garrett Carr's The Boy from the Sea is a brilliantly moving tale of an abandoned baby who rocks a small Irish town, bringing together a community - and igniting lifelong rivalries. The Boy from the Sea will be our first book club choice of 2026 and we're thrilled to be welcoming Garrett to our Romiley shop on Monday 2nd February when he'll be discussing his debut novel with bookshop owner Kelly. The talk will be followed by an audience Q&A and book signing.

Tickets are just £5.00 (or £9.99 including a copy of the book.)

Doors: 6.00pm, starts: 6.30pm

About the book:

In 1973 on the west coast of Ireland, a baby is found abandoned on the beach. Who is he? Where is he from?

Ambrose, a local fisherman, is far more interested in who he will become and – with a curious community looking on – takes the baby home and adopts him. But for Declan, the baby's new brother, this arrival is surely bad news. Rivalries can be decades in the making . . .

Set over twenty years, The Boy from the Sea is about a restless boy trying to find his place, in a town caught in the storm of a rapidly changing world.

"Compulsive reading . . . Compassionate, lyrical and full of devilment" - Louise Kennedy (Trespasses)

"The Boy from the Sea has that rare quality I often find myself searching for in a novel – narrative intimacy among the vastness of life. Garrett Carr is meticulous and precise in his writing – the skilled invisibility of a true craftsman" - Rónán Hession (Leonard and Hungry Paul)

About the author:

Garrett Carr teaches Creative Writing at the Seamus Heaney Centre, Queen's University Belfast, and he is a frequent contributor to The Guardian and The Irish Times. His non-fiction The Rule of the Land: Walking Ireland's Border was a BBC Radio 4 Book of the Week. The Boy from the Sea is his debut novel.