Saltwater Years

When Mara Carson returns to her coastal hometown to care for the aunt who once saved her, she expects casseroles, quiet guilt, and maybe a nervous breakdown - but not the tidal wave of memories waiting on the shoreline. The past she spent sixteen years avoiding shows up everywhere: in photo albums, in old friends, in a letter she was never meant to read, and in the eyes of a widower who smiles like he's seen every kind of storm.
As grief and healing crash into each other, Mara must decide whether she's allowed to build a future that isn't shaped by her childhood wounds. It turns out there's nothing quite as terrifying - or hopeful - as realizing life might still have love left in it.