Shattered Sea by Catherine Cowles

POV: Dual 1st Person
PoP: 59%
Tropes: Hollywood Norm; Small Town; Slow Burn; Instant Attraction; Suspense: Chronic Pain
Series: Tattered and Torn Book Four 
Type of Series: Series of Standalones
Rate: 5 /5 Stars
CW: Grief, Tragic Accident, Drug abuse
Release Date: September 13, 2022

There was a moment when I saw this blurb and the sneak peaks when I wondered just how this book was going to work into this series.  But then I remembered this is Catherine Cowles and she is going to write an emotionally draining but excellent body of work.

Boden and Laiken… these are two extremely broken people but broken in ways that no one can ever really come back from.  They have had events in their life that they have struggled with, events that they are having a hard time moving on from, events that are shaping the ways in which they live their lives.  There is so much emotion and pain worked into these pages that you can’t help but get lost in the words.

Boden is this steady guy that you don’t expect him to be based on his background and recent life changes.  Laiken is still healing and will always be healing from an event that takes place in the prologue.  But she realizes after she meets Boden that she wants to move forward… not stay stationary anymore.  Yes, she has grown, and yes, she has moved forward from the events, but she hasn’t really allowed herself to take that next step of letting go just a little bit.

Grief plays a HUGE part of this book, and if you follow Catherine Cowles than you know this story is extremely personal to her, and you can tell.  She treats the grief in this story perfectly.  Because it’s true… grief is different for everyone.  I don’t want to give anything away because this is one of those stories that you need to read to get the full effect. And I don’t usually use quotes in my reviews, but this one stood out.

“It had been so long since I’d felt truly seen.  There were so many pieces of myself that I held back. Pieces that I could protect if I didn’t expose them.  But it was as if Boden had a radar for them all.”