Set against the powerful lakeshore landscape of northern Minnesota, Safe
from the Sea is a heartfelt novel in which a son returns home to
reconnect with his estranged and dying father thirty-five years after
the tragic wreck of a Great Lakes ore boat that the father only
partially survived and that has divided them emotionally ever since.
When his father for the first time finally tells the story of the
horrific disaster he has carried with him so long, it leads the two men
to reconsider each other.
Meanwhile, Noah's own struggle to make a life with an absent father has
found its real reward in his relationship with his sagacious wife,
Natalie, whose complications with infertility issues have marked her
husband's life in ways he only fully realizes as the reconciliation with
his father takes shape.
Peter Geye has delivered an archetypal story of a father and son, of the
tug and pull of family bonds, of Norwegian immigrant culture, of
dramatic shipwrecks and the business and adventure of Great Lakes
shipping in a setting that simply casts a spell over the characters as
well as the reader.