Would You Chase the Unexplainable? | Habits of the Sea Review

ARC WAS PROVIDED VIA NETGALLEY IN EXCHANGE FOR AN HONEST REVIEW

Perhaps there is no deeper wound in a woman's chest than the road not taken. The life that might have been.

What would you do if you experienced the unexplainable at 12 years old and spent the next 20 years moving through life in a haze, feeling unsettled and like something was not quite right and missing despite your life looking good on paper?

Would you chase the unexplainable, or would you stay in your present, not knowing whether the answer you seek lies in what you tried to convince yourself was a dream?

Habits of the Sea was beautifully bathed in heartache. Shea Ernshaw has the gift to make you feel like you were there watching Ellie and Clay like a fly on the wall. You felt the longing she felt for a feeling she couldn't describe. As we grow older, I feel like it is very easy to fall into the pattern of "what if". What if I followed my heart? What if I took this job instead of that job? Maybe I should move, and that will make me feel whole again? While I wouldn't necessarily leave the world I knew behind to live my days on a floating island with no indoor plumbing alongside a rugged man (keep the rugged man, hold the outhouse and no modern electricity please), I do understand the drive to chase after what your heart yearns for instead of doing what will make everyone else happy. 

While I did enjoy the book, I felt it dragged a bit in the middle before picking up again around the 80% mark. At times, it felt as monotonous as Ellie and Clay waking up every morning to tend to their farmland on the mysterious island. I will admit, there was a part of me that was wondering if I accidentally picked up a book about the pros of being a tradwife. I was very happy to be proven wrong. I wish we could have seen their relationship blossom in another way rather than the same routine being described on page. I wish we saw them talk more to one another instead of having Clay’s eyes do the talking and read through another excerpt of Ellie tending to the land. We don't really hear about Ellie's interests or who she really was as a person, same with Clay. We get a few mentions of his wife who passed and how it was a marriage of convenience; even then, that conversation felt...weird, almost brushed past. But I also want to contradict myself and say, well, maybe the reason why we don't learn about who they were prior is that neither Ellie nor Clay knew who they were until they started living for themselves and each other and grew into the people we see on our page. 

Anyways, while this book does have a HEA, there are still many, many heartbreaking roads getting there. One in particular had me sobbing at the sentence "I'll still keep the light on for you.” Which brings me back to my question at the start. Would you chase the unexplainable and go against what is expected of you on paper? I know I would, because you never know how it could change you for the better, and there’s nothing better than living your life for yourself; we have so little time.