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Rip Tide

A Novel

ebook
1 of 1 copy available
1 of 1 copy available

An ELLE Favorite Book of 2024!

"Fireworks explode down the shore in Rip Tide, Colleen McKeegan's absorbing novel. At once an insightful look at tangled family dynamics and a wrenching story of youthful delusion, Rip Tide illustrates that for many women, the past is a ticking time bomb. The deeper we bury it, the bigger the boom. Spread out a blanket, crack open Rip Tide and prepare to be dazzled."—Jillian Medoff, author of When We Were Bright and Beautiful

From the author of The Wild One, a heartfelt and suspenseful novel about two sisters returning to their childhood beachfront home who are forced to confront their traumatic past when a body washes ashore.

It's been fifteen years since Kimmy Devine promised herself she'd never move back to Rocky Cape, the idyllic South Jersey beach town where she grew up. She doesn't want to relive the crushing heartbreak and scandal that ravaged her world as a teen. Her younger sister Erin shares those feelings, the wounds she caused so many years ago forever binding her and Kimmy.

Yet here they are, back in their hometown: Kimmy, floundering after quitting her high-powered finance job in London to help her dad run the family's hardware stores; Erin, reeling from fertility issues and an ongoing divorce, begging to be taken seriously by her parents. The more time they spend in Rocky Cape, the stronger the pull of nostalgia, and both Erin and Kimmy slip on the past like a pair of last year's sandals, forgetting about the blisters when worn too long.

As the sisters celebrate their homecoming at their parents' yacht club, a handful of familiar faces arrive to dampen the revelry. The next morning, a body is found floating nearby and long-buried secrets from their adolescence begin to emerge. Someone from the sisters' past, it seems, is out for revenge.

Told in fast-paced, dual timelines, Rip Tide is a steamy, tension-filled tale of suspense about family, friendships broken and repaired, young love lost and rekindled, forgiveness and second chances, taking control of your life, and the dangerous decisions we make when blinded by desire.

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    • Publisher's Weekly

      June 3, 2024
      At the start of this disappointing standalone from McKeegan (The Wild One), 33-year-old Kimmy Devine quits her finance job in London to take over her ailing father’s hardware store in Rocky Cape, N.J. Though Kimmy vowed 15 years ago that she’d never return to her hometown, she’s delighted to see her younger sister, Erin, who has come home to cope with fertility issues and her impending divorce. The sisters’ parents host a homecoming party at their yacht club, which quickly turns tense as former friends and exes show up and poke at old wounds. The next morning, the Devines learn that Erin’s teenage crush, Peter Cameron, has been found dead in an apparent suicide. Shifting between the past and the present, McKeegan gradually doles out details about the disturbing reason why Kimmy left Rocky Cape and how her past and Peter’s death are intertwined. Though McKeegan establishes a vivid sense of place, the drawn-out plot is bogged down by a cast of vapid, largely interchangeable characters, and the mystery’s resolution is too far-fetched. This fails to leave a mark. Agent: Michelle Brower, Trellis Literary.

    • Kirkus

      July 1, 2024
      Sisters in their 30s return to their Jersey Shore hometown, where they revisit lingering demons from their adolescence. Although it's really about the ways young women struggle to overcome unhealthy teenage relationships, McKeegan's novel has the trappings of a beach-read mystery. On the first page of the first chapter, labeled "Beach Week 2022: Day Six," a dead body shows up; then the book jumps back to "Day One" and alternates between Beach Week 2022 and events at least 15 years earlier. Kimmy, a "finance superstar," arrives in Rocky Cape after a long absence. Her younger sister, Erin, has been living at home since her difficult divorce at the height of the Covid-19 pandemic. As the week wears on, each sister relives painful memories of secrets and betrayals. The depiction of their love-hate relationship as kids is funny if painful, and McKeegan's depiction of the sex, drugs, and general hedonism of teens during the early 2000s rings painfully true. Kimmy got in over her head and ended her senior year in deep trauma and humiliation. Now she reconnects with old friends, including her high school passion, Justin, who slept with her regularly back then though his official girlfriend was Erin's nasty friend Madison. Despite Kimmy's memory of Justin's part in her ultimate humiliation, she can't resist their mutual attraction during Beach Week. Erin had a secret teenage passion, too: Peter, an older college boy with whom she carried on a confusing flirtation, her devotion fueled by his mixed signals. After moving home two years ago, she fell into an affair with the married Peter. Now Peter is that dead body. Eventually the book moves past Day Six to follow the detective--a former classmate of Kimmy's--who's investigating whether Peter's death was suicide or murder. There's a fun twist at the end but McKeegan's strength is bringing to life the intricate family and small-town social dynamics on display. A dark, witty beach read about beach-town shenanigans.

      COPYRIGHT(2024) Kirkus Reviews, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.

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  • English

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