Reviews with content warning for Rape - The Great Offshore Grounds

Siblings struggle to find their place in the world and discover their true origin stories. They are raised unconventionally, which could be expansive for them, but it leaves them feeling unmoored. This is a road trip, an adventure story, a ghost story, and a coming-of-age story (for characters who are 30+). It's full of grief, rage, trauma, and ultimately love. It's also…A LOT. The key word here IS “struggle.” It's not easy — inside the story or out. There's so much content crammed into the book's pages. I've seen it called a “character-based” story, which it is — to some extent. But there's also a lot of forced distance created as you experience the characters feeling too close to one another and not close enough (to *anyone*). Most of the shining moments for me occurred within Kirsten's story and I wish we'd gotten to hear more from her.

The Great Offshore Grounds is one of those books that I wish I'd read in a college course, alongside a professor to guide me through deep dives and toward relevant research. I think the text would be enhanced by learning more about environmental activism, tall ships, the free love movement, and more. I simply didn't have the drive (or the time, quite honestly) to do the research on my own. There's some great writing here. I wish it'd been presented a bit differently, perhaps as interconnected short stories or a slimmer novel.

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celiab1's review against another edition

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adventurous challenging emotional sad tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.25

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dominicangirl's review against another edition

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adventurous emotional slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.75

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parnellek's review against another edition

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adventurous challenging emotional reflective tense fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.5

This book follows a family as they grapple with themes of identity, love, freedom, independence, and home. The initial premise is that two women are raised as sisters, but have different birth moms who were in a polyamorous relationship with their absent father. They set off on a cross-country road trip to find the woman that gave birth to one of them, but was never present in their lives. From there the book explores the characters as individuals, often describing the mundane in a heartbreakingly beautiful way, or by using magical realism.

I really enjoyed this book, but felt like I wasn’t smart enough for it.

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katrinasherise's review against another edition

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adventurous emotional sad medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.25

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kristenhg's review against another edition

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adventurous emotional inspiring reflective sad medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

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knkoch's review against another edition

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adventurous challenging dark emotional hopeful reflective sad slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

This was a big one. I’ve been sitting here thinking about this one for a little while. It made me feel big things, and resonated with so much I’ve been thinking about these days.

It’s a big, sprawling family epic, a quest, a tale, but in the most modern sense. These people are so deeply grounded (even ground down) in their time. They live on the margins and scrape to get by. And yet they are connected to the past: the often but not always ugly past of this country, and of the world. This is a book of colonial possession and individual freedom; national and personal myth.

It’s big and it’s hard and could be triggering (see content warnings), but for me at this moment, it was really worth it. I felt really seen in this and the way the author writes about desperation, pain, failure, and hope. There’s a playlist on Spotify under the book’s title that runs in similar moods.

I’ve been worried lately that I’m not thinking about what I’m reading deeply enough, or that I’m missing things. This was a reminder (a call to arms) to set my own terms, and live by my own decisions. That doesn’t mean there are no consequences. It means only that I’m free.

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physalia's review against another edition

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emotional reflective medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.5

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