The Boy from the Sea

As read on BBC Radio 4
A Sunday Times Best Book of 2025
An Observer Best Debut of 2025

The Boy from the Sea is Garrett Carr's brilliantly moving tale of an abandoned baby who rocks a small Irish town, bringing together a community - and igniting lifelong rivalries.

In 1973 on the west coast of Ireland, a baby is found abandoned on the beach. Who is he? Where is he from? What changes will he bring?

Ambrose, a local fisherman, is far more interested in who he will become and – with a curious community looking on – takes the baby home and adopts him. But for Declan, the baby’s new brother, this arrival is surely bad news. Rivalries can be decades in the making . . .

Set over twenty years, Garrett Carr’s The Boy from the Sea is about a restless boy trying to find his place, in a town caught in the storm of a rapidly changing world.