Lucy by the Sea

A Novel

By: Elizabeth Strout

Narrated by: Kimberly Farr

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • From the Pulitzer Prize–winning author of My Name is Lucy Barton and Olive Kitteridge comes a “poised and moving” (Vogue) novel about a divorced couple stuck together during lockdown—and the love, loss, despair, and hope that animate us even as the world seems to be falling apart.

“Strout’s understanding of the human condition is capacious.”—NPR

A BEST BOOK OF THE YEAR: The New York Times Book Review, The New Yorker, Oprah Daily, Entertainment Weekly, San Francisco Chronicle, NPR, Time, The Washington Post, The Christian Science Monitor, PopSugar, She Reads

With her trademark spare, crystalline prose—a voice infused with “intimate, fragile, desperate humanness” (The Washington Post)—Elizabeth Strout turns her exquisitely tuned eye to the inner workings of the human heart, following the indomitable heroine of My Name Is Lucy Barton through the early days of the pandemic.

As a panicked world goes into lockdown, Lucy Barton is uprooted from her life in Manhattan and bundled away to a small town in Maine by her ex-husband and on-again, off-again friend, William. For the next several months, it’s just Lucy, William, and their complex past together in a little house nestled against the moody, swirling sea.

Rich with empathy and emotion, Lucy by the Sea vividly captures the fear and struggles that come with isolation, as well as the hope, peace, and possibilities that those long, quiet days can inspire. At the heart of this story are the deep human connections that unite us even when we’re apart—the pain of a beloved daughter’s suffering, the emptiness that comes from the death of a loved one, the promise of a new friendship, and the comfort of an old, enduring love.

Shortlisted for the Rathbones Folio Prize

©2022 Elizabeth Strout (P)2022 Random House Audio

Critic reviews

“Graceful, deceptively light . . . Lucy’s done the hard work of transformation. May we do the same.”—The New York Times

“Lucy by the Sea has an anecdotal surface that belies a firm underlying structure. It is meant to feel like life—random, surprising, occasionally lit with flashes of larger meaning—but it is art.”—The New Yorker

“No novelist working today has Strout’s extraordinary capacity for radical empathy, for seeing the essence of people beyond reductive categories, for uniting us without sentimentality. I didn’t just love Lucy by the Sea; I needed it. May droves of readers come to feel enlarged, comforted, and genuinely uplifted by Lucy’s story.”—The Boston Globe

For Strout fans only

I always get something out of her books but this one not a favorite. I don't know if the character of Lucy merits this many books. Also, I wonder if Covid has become the third rail for novelists.

Another great book by ES

What a gem. I thought it might be too soon but it was ok. It was quiet, even reverent to our shared experience of the last several years. You will recognize some old character friends and also realize some of the characters are living right along side of you. Some in your own family.

Life's Overview

A gentle story of how one woman moves through life's constant and variable challenges. Marriage, separation, daughters and their relationships are all there in the setting of the Covid pandemic's impact on New York City and Maine. Interwoven is an insightful picture of aging's effects. Joys and sadness realistically portrayed.

Lucy by the sea

Enjoyed the story immensely. The reader however had strange inflections at times which made it hard to capture the feelings being discussed. Overall it was great .

A Must Read

I absolutely loved it. Elizabeth Strout does it again with her brillance with words that describe her life, her losses, family life, aging, and lessons about love during the days of living in the pandemics.

No words. Loved it

Thank you. So human. Captures perfectly what it’s like to be a mother and a spouse

a nice story

I love this author and I enjoyed this book but it wasn't her best for me. I guess I didn't really want to go back to the early pandemic times. or maybe it was just kind of dull. not sure if it was the book or me. but I did enjoy it. it just wasn't spectacular!

Feel good story for the dark days of winter

It was so nice to reconnect with William and Lucy. I really enjoyed this book. Elizabeth really knows how to draw you into the characters and make you feel as if they are real people that you know.

Too triggering

If you had a hard time at the start of the pandemic, don’t read this. Too sad & triggering . Did not have it in me finish it.

Gentle but deep

Yes the narrator was slow. But so was Lucy. As an older woman who has had two marriages to men as well as some shorter relationships with women, I found this book interesting and helpful.

I like how it wound together the personal with the larger political context.

I was sorry to see it end.