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The Ocean Above Me
Trapped undersea in a capsized shrimping trawler, a damaged former war correspondent is forced to confront a deadly secret from his past as he struggles to survive in this gripping novel of trauma, loss, love, and redemption from award-winning journalist and author of The Things They Cannot Say Kevin Sites.
Former war correspondent Lukas Landon is alone, trapped under 150-feet of water in an overturned shrimp trawler at the bottom of the ocean. The only thing keeping him alive is an air bubble in the ship’s bow. But the water level is rising, and time is running out. Landon doesn’t know if he will survive . . . or if he even deserves to. After years of covering bloody battles in Afghanistan and Iraq, Landon’s once promising life took a steep nosedive.
But he may have found a path to a series of in-depth stories on the Philomena, the rarest of South Carolina shrimp boats skippered by decorated former army sergeant Clarita Esteban. A Black woman struggling to survive in a white man’s world, Clarita has assembled a crew of misfits as deeply wounded as herself; a Cuban first mate who came to America during the Mariel boatlift and his troubled younger cousin; a quiet Haitian cook with a secret black book; a deckhand, the only member of the ship’s former crew willing to work for a Black female skipper; and Clarita’s daughter, who lost a college basketball scholarship to an injury.
As Landon slowly earns the disparate crew’s trust, uncovering their pasts—and how each landed aboard this rusty bucket of bolts with its own shaded history—he keeps his own story and the events that unmoored the foundation of his life a secret. But when catastrophe strikes—leaving him twenty-fathoms deep in exquisite isolation—Landon has no one to question but himself. Will he finally come clean? And if he does, will he make it out alive from this 110-ton steel tomb under the sea to finally tell the truth to those who need to hear it?
A thrilling fight for survival and a poignant story of loss and redemption, The Ocean Above Me is a literary masterpiece that explores the effects of trauma, the pain of forgiveness, and the light of love that burns in the darkest depths.
Former war correspondent Lukas Landon is alone, trapped under 150-feet of water in an overturned shrimp trawler at the bottom of the ocean. The only thing keeping him alive is an air bubble in the ship’s bow. But the water level is rising, and time is running out. Landon doesn’t know if he will survive . . . or if he even deserves to. After years of covering bloody battles in Afghanistan and Iraq, Landon’s once promising life took a steep nosedive.
But he may have found a path to a series of in-depth stories on the Philomena, the rarest of South Carolina shrimp boats skippered by decorated former army sergeant Clarita Esteban. A Black woman struggling to survive in a white man’s world, Clarita has assembled a crew of misfits as deeply wounded as herself; a Cuban first mate who came to America during the Mariel boatlift and his troubled younger cousin; a quiet Haitian cook with a secret black book; a deckhand, the only member of the ship’s former crew willing to work for a Black female skipper; and Clarita’s daughter, who lost a college basketball scholarship to an injury.
As Landon slowly earns the disparate crew’s trust, uncovering their pasts—and how each landed aboard this rusty bucket of bolts with its own shaded history—he keeps his own story and the events that unmoored the foundation of his life a secret. But when catastrophe strikes—leaving him twenty-fathoms deep in exquisite isolation—Landon has no one to question but himself. Will he finally come clean? And if he does, will he make it out alive from this 110-ton steel tomb under the sea to finally tell the truth to those who need to hear it?
A thrilling fight for survival and a poignant story of loss and redemption, The Ocean Above Me is a literary masterpiece that explores the effects of trauma, the pain of forgiveness, and the light of love that burns in the darkest depths.
272 pages, Hardcover
First published July 11, 2023
24 people are currently reading
15203 people want to read
About the author
Kevin Sites
8 books70 followersKEVIN SITES is an award-winning journalist and author.
He has worked as a reporter for more than thirty years, half of them covering war and disaster for ABC, NBC, CNN, Yahoo News, and Vice News.
During that time he helped pioneer the concept of self-sufficient, video field reporting known as backpack journalism.
He was a 2010 Nieman Journalism Fellow at Harvard University and a 2012 Dart Fellow in Journalism and Trauma at Columbia University.
For a decade he lived in Hong Kong and taught at the University of Hong Kong as an associate professor of practice in journalism.
He is the author of three books on war: In the Hot Zone, The Things They Cannot Say, and Swimming with Warlords.
His debut novel, published by Harper, will be available in bookstores July 11, 2023.
He lives in Oregon.
He has worked as a reporter for more than thirty years, half of them covering war and disaster for ABC, NBC, CNN, Yahoo News, and Vice News.
During that time he helped pioneer the concept of self-sufficient, video field reporting known as backpack journalism.
He was a 2010 Nieman Journalism Fellow at Harvard University and a 2012 Dart Fellow in Journalism and Trauma at Columbia University.
For a decade he lived in Hong Kong and taught at the University of Hong Kong as an associate professor of practice in journalism.
He is the author of three books on war: In the Hot Zone, The Things They Cannot Say, and Swimming with Warlords.
His debut novel, published by Harper, will be available in bookstores July 11, 2023.
He lives in Oregon.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 83 reviews
July 15, 2023
There are several detailed reviews here but I simply wanted to add my perspective.
As an avid reader I am quite discerning when it comes to page-turners/thrillers. My heart was in my throat the entire time I was reading it. It felt as if you were there, experiencing every wrenching moment with Lukas.
I found it emotionally draining to read … in a good way.
Bravo Kevin Sites, for taking readers under the sea in such a descriptive, real way.
As an avid reader I am quite discerning when it comes to page-turners/thrillers. My heart was in my throat the entire time I was reading it. It felt as if you were there, experiencing every wrenching moment with Lukas.
I found it emotionally draining to read … in a good way.
Bravo Kevin Sites, for taking readers under the sea in such a descriptive, real way.
June 26, 2023
I came very close to putting this book down and not finishing it on several occasions. It was slow in parts and I wasn't connecting with the stories Landon (the main character, who is a journalist) was relaying about the shrimp boat and its crew. But wow, am I glad I stayed until the end! I'm not even sure I have words to convey how well the author connected all the dots and wrapped up the story. It was poignant and heavy, but masterfully done!
September 27, 2023
This was pretty good. Until it wasn't. I was not the person for this book and I would not have read it had I known how things would shake out in the end.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
July 9, 2023
“The Ocean Above Me” is a page-turner, and so much more. Author Kevin Sites has said its protagonist, journalist Lukas Landon, is not an autobiographical creation. But those familiar with Sites’ body of work as a war correspondent that includes extended stints in Afghanistan, Iraq, and some 50 other “hot zones” of conflict around the world, during which he pioneered the “SoJo” phenomenon - journalists traveling alone in combat areas, armed only with cameras, modem, and a satellite phone – will recognize that the sinews of Lukas Landon are woven from the threads of Kevin Sites’ experience.
Just as Lukas Landon does in his struggle to stay alive in a capsized shrimp boat on the ocean floor off the Georgia coast, Sites employs his journalistic tool kit to fashion a riveting tale of suffering, endurance, perseverance, and, ultimately, individual triumph. He constructs the story with the same approach he took to war photography, using multiple lenses and perspectives to bring meaning and context to the urgent, confusing and often desperate scenes he sees. Sites brings his exhaustive research methods to this work, which benefits greatly from his own considerable experience as a diver. There is even a “story within a story,” as we read Landon’s dispatches to his newspaper, embedded in Landon’s own tale of his fateful journey on the Philomena, one with a remarkable and unexpected ending.
This is an impressive and compelling first novel, informed by a lifetime of impactful reporting. The words of a poem written by one of Sites’ characters, the young woman Olveda Estaban, serve as a fitting salute to its debut: “I will hurl my words into darkness, and wait for the echo.”
It is sure to come.
Bruno F. Battistoli, Ph.D.
Editor, National Security & Foreign Policy – Newsweek
Just as Lukas Landon does in his struggle to stay alive in a capsized shrimp boat on the ocean floor off the Georgia coast, Sites employs his journalistic tool kit to fashion a riveting tale of suffering, endurance, perseverance, and, ultimately, individual triumph. He constructs the story with the same approach he took to war photography, using multiple lenses and perspectives to bring meaning and context to the urgent, confusing and often desperate scenes he sees. Sites brings his exhaustive research methods to this work, which benefits greatly from his own considerable experience as a diver. There is even a “story within a story,” as we read Landon’s dispatches to his newspaper, embedded in Landon’s own tale of his fateful journey on the Philomena, one with a remarkable and unexpected ending.
This is an impressive and compelling first novel, informed by a lifetime of impactful reporting. The words of a poem written by one of Sites’ characters, the young woman Olveda Estaban, serve as a fitting salute to its debut: “I will hurl my words into darkness, and wait for the echo.”
It is sure to come.
Bruno F. Battistoli, Ph.D.
Editor, National Security & Foreign Policy – Newsweek
September 2, 2023
Found this painfully boring and predictable to the point I almost didn’t bother finishing it. This whole story could have been wrapped up in two chapters
April 29, 2024
I would give this a 1.5, the extra being for some of the side characters. Very repetitive, which took away from the “thrill” that was supposed to be there. Did not vibe with the main character whatsoever. Only finished it because it was a book club read.
September 8, 2023
A heroing true story of a former war correspondent trapped in a capsized ship troller.
It was a bit slow at times, but overall, it was a great read!
It was a bit slow at times, but overall, it was a great read!
July 2, 2023
Before I started this book, I had an idea of the basic premise of the story, but I was not prepared for how thought-provoking it would be. With very little preamble, the author starts you right off at the electrifying heart of the disaster around which everything else circulates, a genuinely heart-pounding start to the book. That really pulled me in and made me want to keep going.
Lukas Landon is a former war correspondent who is now working stateside and doing a story on the shrimp industry by going on board a trawler and filing dispatches from there. When a storm capsizes the boat, Lukas finds himself trapped alone underwater in the sunken ship, sheltering in an air bubble and trying to figure his way out of his predicament. At the same time he has plenty of opportunity to re-examine his life and the mistakes that brought him there. While regularly returning to this dual narrative, the author also carefully builds the other characters until they become fully fleshed people familiar to you, each in their own way contributing to Lukas’ self-reflection and determination to get out of his predicament. I did feel that at moments toward the end, Lukas’ revelations about himself seemed a little “preachy,” but not enough to override my enjoyment of the book.
I felt like there was some real research that went into some of the details, both with regard to the science of being underwater (referencing scuba diving) and the realities of reporting from a war zone, but I suspect the author also drew on his own experiences to lend a real air of authenticity to these aspects, something I really appreciated.
In the end, the story builds until you understand that this is as much about introspection as it is action, about examining the past as figuring out how to escape an underwater prison, as the main character confronts a variety of failures in his life, right up to the biggest secret haunting him. Ultimately, I couldn’t have been more surprised at the ending, and I find I now have a lot to think about.
Lukas Landon is a former war correspondent who is now working stateside and doing a story on the shrimp industry by going on board a trawler and filing dispatches from there. When a storm capsizes the boat, Lukas finds himself trapped alone underwater in the sunken ship, sheltering in an air bubble and trying to figure his way out of his predicament. At the same time he has plenty of opportunity to re-examine his life and the mistakes that brought him there. While regularly returning to this dual narrative, the author also carefully builds the other characters until they become fully fleshed people familiar to you, each in their own way contributing to Lukas’ self-reflection and determination to get out of his predicament. I did feel that at moments toward the end, Lukas’ revelations about himself seemed a little “preachy,” but not enough to override my enjoyment of the book.
I felt like there was some real research that went into some of the details, both with regard to the science of being underwater (referencing scuba diving) and the realities of reporting from a war zone, but I suspect the author also drew on his own experiences to lend a real air of authenticity to these aspects, something I really appreciated.
In the end, the story builds until you understand that this is as much about introspection as it is action, about examining the past as figuring out how to escape an underwater prison, as the main character confronts a variety of failures in his life, right up to the biggest secret haunting him. Ultimately, I couldn’t have been more surprised at the ending, and I find I now have a lot to think about.
June 23, 2023
Lukas Landon is aboard the trawler Philomena writing a series of articles for his newspaper about the shrimping industry off the South Carolina coast. It’s been a brutal season and the Philomena is making one last run in hopes of staying solvent. The boat’s captain is an Army veteran named Clarita Esteban. “Marine scientists fear that if we continue at the present rate, the oceans will be emptied of our main seafood sources as soon as 2050.” We are slammed into the story when the boat is flipped by a powerful storm and sinks. Landon is trapped in the capsized boat and as his chances of rescue dwindle he reckons with his life’s most difficult moments.
The story is told with flashback sections along with interviews and articles that Landon has submitted to his newspaper throughout the week he has been onboard. I’ll admit to being very close to putting this one down at the halfway point. I kept going because I read a review saying it was worth it. And it was! To put my reading experience into perspective I had just read Drowning by TJ Newman and had followed the rescue attempts for the occupants of the Titan vessel exploring the Titanic remains. I think my brain needed a return to dry land. This one is more character study than it is thriller, imo so be prepared for some lengthy meditative reflections.
The story is told with flashback sections along with interviews and articles that Landon has submitted to his newspaper throughout the week he has been onboard. I’ll admit to being very close to putting this one down at the halfway point. I kept going because I read a review saying it was worth it. And it was! To put my reading experience into perspective I had just read Drowning by TJ Newman and had followed the rescue attempts for the occupants of the Titan vessel exploring the Titanic remains. I think my brain needed a return to dry land. This one is more character study than it is thriller, imo so be prepared for some lengthy meditative reflections.
October 28, 2023
Thoroughly enjoyed this book that I was given a copy. The premise is a newspaper reporter with a past tags along with a shrimp boat in the Gulf on it's last run of the year. Boat gets caught in an early winter storm, the engine breaks down and a rouge wave sends the ship to the bottom. Landon, the reporter who was sleeping below decks gets sent down to the bottom but survives due to an air pocket. He's injured but cobbles together whatever he can within his cabin and eventually takes a couple scavenging trips underwater risking his life. As the book progresses the plot toggles between scenes of Landon and members of the crew going about their day to day activities and post boat sinking with Landon trying to figure out what to do. The author obviously went thru meticulous research and the plot and scenario(s) are very believable. As Landon is caught literally between the bottom of the sea and possible rescue, he ponders his meaning of life, what he's gone thru previously as a war reporter, his PTSD that ruined his marriage, etc. He also recalls and mulls the various deckhands and members of the crew, their intricate stories and pasts. In the end it's almost a morality play which plays out under the waves and in Landon's thoughts and feelings. The last few pages had me close to tears. The writing is superb. I won't give away the ending. This book was a surprise to me not knowing what to expect having won the book in a drawing but I'm so glad I do. It was very enjoyable and I'd recommend it to anyone that likes good, realistic fiction.
May 11, 2024
"Maybe that's exactly what had happened to him. His bubble had preserved the lessons and memories of his life, but also renewed his ability to value them."
"The possibility to emerge, a shimmering orb of light, better than you were before-or not at all."
"So that's what I learned, a lifetime of lessons in a handful of people. Often we're so anxious, so restless asking over and over again what is in store for me? What is my life supposed to mean?...I've often wondered:If people knew the story of their lives in advance, how many would elect to live them? We are all collateral damage; victims of the unintended consequences of our own decisions. We all suffer desperately and in our own way. But we shouldn't let our own suffering make others suffer more....Maybe our suffering should motivate us to make others suffer less."
This book had me on the edge of my seat. A 'real page turner' if you will. It's the story of a journalist who goes aboard a shrimping boat for a story. The boat gets stuck in a storm, and Lukas Landon (the journalist) is stuck in an air bubble in the ships head. It is a harrowing story of survival, of Lukas coming to terms with events that have occurred in his lifetime, and forgiving himself for all the wrongs he has done. I liked that the author included the fate of the other crew members aboard, so we aren't left wondering.
This book would make an excellent movie!
"The possibility to emerge, a shimmering orb of light, better than you were before-or not at all."
"So that's what I learned, a lifetime of lessons in a handful of people. Often we're so anxious, so restless asking over and over again what is in store for me? What is my life supposed to mean?...I've often wondered:If people knew the story of their lives in advance, how many would elect to live them? We are all collateral damage; victims of the unintended consequences of our own decisions. We all suffer desperately and in our own way. But we shouldn't let our own suffering make others suffer more....Maybe our suffering should motivate us to make others suffer less."
This book had me on the edge of my seat. A 'real page turner' if you will. It's the story of a journalist who goes aboard a shrimping boat for a story. The boat gets stuck in a storm, and Lukas Landon (the journalist) is stuck in an air bubble in the ships head. It is a harrowing story of survival, of Lukas coming to terms with events that have occurred in his lifetime, and forgiving himself for all the wrongs he has done. I liked that the author included the fate of the other crew members aboard, so we aren't left wondering.
This book would make an excellent movie!
November 7, 2023
The book turned out to be more intense than I had initially anticipated.
The protagonist of this book, Landon, is a reporter with a troubled past. He's the kind of person who enjoys studying other people's lives to avoid dealing with his own issues (think Mark Cohen from 'Rent').
When the book starts Landon is preparing to write a book about the shrimping business of the Lowcountry and is on a shrimping troller off of the South Carolina/Georgia coast. During a storm, Landon needs to use the bathroom, and that's when disaster strikes. The ship capsizes, leaving him trapped in the bathroom with an air bubble, and he's badly injured.
The narrative alternates between Landon's dangerous situation in the capsized boat, his interviews with the workers on the boat, and glimpses into his own life. This storytelling technique is executed excellently (this is one of my favorite storytelling techniques), as it prevents the narrative from feeling too claustrophobic. I often struggle with books that create a claustrophobic vibe, but this wasn't a problem for me with this book.
The stories shared by the workers on the shrimp troller are all touching and often deal with loss, belonging, poverty, and immigration. As Landon reveals more about his own life, we come to see how flawed he is and how he is the reason for most of his hardships/
All in all, I enjoyed this book but wasn't amazed by it.
The protagonist of this book, Landon, is a reporter with a troubled past. He's the kind of person who enjoys studying other people's lives to avoid dealing with his own issues (think Mark Cohen from 'Rent').
When the book starts Landon is preparing to write a book about the shrimping business of the Lowcountry and is on a shrimping troller off of the South Carolina/Georgia coast. During a storm, Landon needs to use the bathroom, and that's when disaster strikes. The ship capsizes, leaving him trapped in the bathroom with an air bubble, and he's badly injured.
The narrative alternates between Landon's dangerous situation in the capsized boat, his interviews with the workers on the boat, and glimpses into his own life. This storytelling technique is executed excellently (this is one of my favorite storytelling techniques), as it prevents the narrative from feeling too claustrophobic. I often struggle with books that create a claustrophobic vibe, but this wasn't a problem for me with this book.
The stories shared by the workers on the shrimp troller are all touching and often deal with loss, belonging, poverty, and immigration. As Landon reveals more about his own life, we come to see how flawed he is and how he is the reason for most of his hardships/
All in all, I enjoyed this book but wasn't amazed by it.
September 7, 2023
OMG and I am going on a cruise soon.
Luke Landon is an adventurer. Writing about wars all over the world but he is so much more and we get to really understand him as he tries to survive in an air bubble in a capsized boat at the bottom of the ocean
Luke Landon is an adventurer. Writing about wars all over the world but he is so much more and we get to really understand him as he tries to survive in an air bubble in a capsized boat at the bottom of the ocean
June 9, 2024
WOW. this book!!
September 23, 2024
I hate the ocean idk why I did this to myself. I didn’t really love any of the characters but I did like the ending
December 9, 2023
This is fascinating to read. Lukas Landon is a former war correspondent who, like a lot of soldiers and correspondents who went through the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, still has problems with the violence and killing he witnessed. He was a crime reporter with the Miami Herald, but substance abuse and mental issues have cost him that job; he now works as a features editor for the much smaller Charleston, South Carolina, Globe-Democrat. But in December 2018, with the shrimping industry in a tailspin, Landon is assigned to do a week-long feature on the shrimp boat Philomena (ironically, in the Catholic world, Philomena is the patron saint of lost causes). But then when a major storm slams through the area, the ship is blasted, overturns, and sinks, upside down, in about a hundred and fifty feet of water. Landon is thrown around but survives in an air bubble inside the head. The focus of this novel is his struggle for survival as well as his struggle to understand what he has done with his life, but what really made this story shine was how he covered the backstories of the others on the boat with him. The captain is Clarita Esteban, a Black female soldier who has seen combat in Iraq and Afghanistan. The copilot, Lorenzo Ortiz, is a Cuban refugee who escaped during the Mariel boatlift in 1980. The cook, Emmanuel Etienne, escaped Haiti on a raft made of inner tubes, was the only one of his family to survive, made it to Miami and was "adopted" by a Haitian/Dominican family. Author Kevin Sites takes these backstories and weaves them into Landon's broader struggle to somehow get out alive, making The Ocean Above Me impossible to put down. If you like stories with punch and strong characters, you'll be reading this long into the night!
July 9, 2023
Intriguing title, wild dilemma, compelling story wonderfully told.
I was drawn in by the cover, then by the beauty of the writing, then by the massive 'how's this gonna end' question; I was hooked.
The Ocean Above Me seems ripe for an edge-of-your-seat thriller, like "Captain Phillips," and Lukas Landon is an award-winning movie role. Which will be another way to enjoy this story, I just hope people read the book first because the author's use of language is so enjoyable.
Definitely recommend. Especially if you're on a flight or vacation where you can pleasurably plough through a book.
I was drawn in by the cover, then by the beauty of the writing, then by the massive 'how's this gonna end' question; I was hooked.
The Ocean Above Me seems ripe for an edge-of-your-seat thriller, like "Captain Phillips," and Lukas Landon is an award-winning movie role. Which will be another way to enjoy this story, I just hope people read the book first because the author's use of language is so enjoyable.
Definitely recommend. Especially if you're on a flight or vacation where you can pleasurably plough through a book.
July 13, 2023
Rating: 2 stars.
This was so disappointing. The beginning was really good, I loved the setting and atmosphere and the action scenes but literally after chapter 3 this became so dull. This was barely a thriller at all, more like literary fiction, and that wasn't at all what I expected after reading the blurb. There were so many repetitive scenes and just no real plot at all. The ending was fine but overall this was a disappointment.
This was so disappointing. The beginning was really good, I loved the setting and atmosphere and the action scenes but literally after chapter 3 this became so dull. This was barely a thriller at all, more like literary fiction, and that wasn't at all what I expected after reading the blurb. There were so many repetitive scenes and just no real plot at all. The ending was fine but overall this was a disappointment.
November 18, 2024
I hate the ocean, so this book was especially horrifying for me.
It was a beautiful story & I teared up at the end.
It was a beautiful story & I teared up at the end.
August 24, 2023
I received a copy of this book from HarperCollins in exchange for an honest review.
Lukas Landon is a man haunted by his war journalist past, which led to the loss of his career path and marriage. Now, he is writing a series of stories from a shrimping boat off the coast of South Carolina, interviewing the crew members and capturing the stories. But his trip goes south when a storm sinks the ship and Lukas finds himself trapped in an air pocket in the ship under 150 feet of water.
As Lukas fights to survive in his isolated pocket of air, the story jumps back in time to tell the crew members' stories but also to slowly unfold Lukas's own life story and what brought him to this moment. Ultimately, this novel is about the immense will to live. In the depths of the sea, Lukas has a fighter's survival instinct and is extremely clear and levelheaded in his desperate bid to survive his ordeal.
The suspense in this novel is immense. The horror of imagining being trapped at the bottom of the ocean with only a tiny dwindling amount of air is horrifying to imagine. The novel is told in alternating chapters that jump back and forth between the beginning of the fishing trip and memories from earlier in Lukas's life. But the chapters that don't focus on the trapped man, even when they are stories about the crew members' horrific childhoods, cannot hold a candle to the horror and suspense of the underwater chapters. I believe the novel would have functioned better with a different layout, perhaps chronological so that the suspense could naturally build as the novel progressed, rather than being constantly punctuated by the end of a chapter.
Beneath the heart stopping suspense of this story, it truly is such a sad tale. Lukas has had such a traumatic life but so have the crew members. But for his war experiences that lead to him shutting down emotionally, Lukas would have never been on that boat and would have never experienced the terrible ordeal of days alone underwater.
Lukas Landon is a man haunted by his war journalist past, which led to the loss of his career path and marriage. Now, he is writing a series of stories from a shrimping boat off the coast of South Carolina, interviewing the crew members and capturing the stories. But his trip goes south when a storm sinks the ship and Lukas finds himself trapped in an air pocket in the ship under 150 feet of water.
As Lukas fights to survive in his isolated pocket of air, the story jumps back in time to tell the crew members' stories but also to slowly unfold Lukas's own life story and what brought him to this moment. Ultimately, this novel is about the immense will to live. In the depths of the sea, Lukas has a fighter's survival instinct and is extremely clear and levelheaded in his desperate bid to survive his ordeal.
The suspense in this novel is immense. The horror of imagining being trapped at the bottom of the ocean with only a tiny dwindling amount of air is horrifying to imagine. The novel is told in alternating chapters that jump back and forth between the beginning of the fishing trip and memories from earlier in Lukas's life. But the chapters that don't focus on the trapped man, even when they are stories about the crew members' horrific childhoods, cannot hold a candle to the horror and suspense of the underwater chapters. I believe the novel would have functioned better with a different layout, perhaps chronological so that the suspense could naturally build as the novel progressed, rather than being constantly punctuated by the end of a chapter.
Beneath the heart stopping suspense of this story, it truly is such a sad tale. Lukas has had such a traumatic life but so have the crew members. But for his war experiences that lead to him shutting down emotionally, Lukas would have never been on that boat and would have never experienced the terrible ordeal of days alone underwater.
August 30, 2023
In many ways the timing of this novel’s release couldn’t have been better. Fresh off the real life horror of Oceangate’s Titan submersible’s implosion and the world watching in real time as the clock ticked down and oxygen ran out for those trapped on board (yes, we know now that they weren’t actually trapped for days under the sea, but at the time we thought they were), comes Kevin Sites’ novel about someone trapped undersea in a capsized boat. Right off the bat this book grabs you and plays to our greatest fear of being trapped under water with a limited supply of oxygen.
On the surface, this book is indeed a thriller and Sites has obviously done his research into the science of surviving underwater. However, by the end of the book the thriller aspect is pretty much secondary to the main thrust of the story, which is that of the protagonist’s history, the dark secrets he holds, and the back stories of the other crew members. This is really more a story of love, loss, trauma and redemption. All the characters’ stories are tied in beautifully by the end.
This will appeal to those looking for the thriller angle, but be prepared for so much more than that. This novel is a lot deeper than the water that’s holding Lucas Landon down on the ocean’s floor. (Sorry, that’s corny but I couldn’t help it.) Seriously, this is a far more powerful book than I expected.
On the surface, this book is indeed a thriller and Sites has obviously done his research into the science of surviving underwater. However, by the end of the book the thriller aspect is pretty much secondary to the main thrust of the story, which is that of the protagonist’s history, the dark secrets he holds, and the back stories of the other crew members. This is really more a story of love, loss, trauma and redemption. All the characters’ stories are tied in beautifully by the end.
This will appeal to those looking for the thriller angle, but be prepared for so much more than that. This novel is a lot deeper than the water that’s holding Lucas Landon down on the ocean’s floor. (Sorry, that’s corny but I couldn’t help it.) Seriously, this is a far more powerful book than I expected.
September 10, 2023
I went into this book with completely incorrect expectations. I thought I was going to get a thrilling, underwater survival tale. That's not what this is. This was a couple hundred pages of character study. A couple of the characters were actually interesting, but most I really didn't like, especially the narrator. He was so whiny and full of complaints that it was difficult to root for him. And I absolutely couldn't stand the female characters. They were so hateful and off-putting I found myself hoping they had drowned.
It felt like the author really just wanted to write a meditation on the horrors of war and thought this trapped under water framing device would make readers more likely to pick his book up. But I found myself bored for the entire novel. Until the last chapter, when I wanted to throw the book across the room. Up until that point I was resting at a 2-star rating, but the last chapter made me wish I could give negative stars. I went from not really liking the book to absolutely hating it.
It felt like the author really just wanted to write a meditation on the horrors of war and thought this trapped under water framing device would make readers more likely to pick his book up. But I found myself bored for the entire novel. Until the last chapter, when I wanted to throw the book across the room. Up until that point I was resting at a 2-star rating, but the last chapter made me wish I could give negative stars. I went from not really liking the book to absolutely hating it.
October 5, 2023
Whenever I read books about characters trying to survive in adverse conditions, I always think, "Oh, yeah, I'd be a goner within hours." I don't think I have the imagination, engineering prowess, or mental strength to go all MacGyver. There were times when I felt like drawings and diagrams would have helped me visualize what Landon was doing. I liked the book and how it jumped between what Landon was doing to survive and his mental state and the "before" when he was interacting with the crew and learning their back stories (while we also learned Landon's back story). We slowly discover what led Landon to be in such a sorry state after his reporting stints during the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. At times, I found myself having to suspend my disbelief, but then realized that sometimes truth is stranger than fiction and there have been many unbelievable feats of survival so I needed to just go with it. The author does a really good job at the end keeping the reader on tenterhooks about whether or not Landon survives. This is a harrowing and claustrophobic book worth reading.
November 22, 2023
Lukas Landon is a former war reporter who is aboard a shrimp trawler reporting on the hardships of the small crew and the struggles of the shrimp industry as a whole. The crew gets caught in a storm that capsizes the boat, and Lukas finds himself trapped in the upside down ship at the bottom of the ocean, isolated from the rest of the crew in a small air bubble inside the ship’s bathroom. Queue a lot of panic-charged reading about his quest to survive, interspersed with chapters about his previous life- a failed marriage, a rough number of years in Afghanistan and Iraq, conversations he had with the shrimp crew in the days leading up to his current predicament…
This was not a relaxing read, but a gripping and poignant one.
“From Lorenzo I learned that even if you only love once, the pain of that loss is worth it every day because you have known love, and that ember never burns out completely. It’s always there smoldering, threatening to catch fire, the possibility of passion goading you forward rather than its absence hollowing you out.”
This was not a relaxing read, but a gripping and poignant one.
“From Lorenzo I learned that even if you only love once, the pain of that loss is worth it every day because you have known love, and that ember never burns out completely. It’s always there smoldering, threatening to catch fire, the possibility of passion goading you forward rather than its absence hollowing you out.”
September 4, 2023
From the very beginning I was drawn in. I found myself sharing parts of Landon’s predicament and handling of it with friends over the course of my reading this expertly written story. Even if I’d not read the jacket flap describing the author’s background and experience, it was clear the reader was in good hands. I love what I learned about the shrimping life, some detailed illustrations about what it can take to survive dreadful & seemingly insurmountable circumstances not only for the human body but for the human spirit. I also loved Sites’ obvious appreciation for the contributions of all members of society (eg the entire crew and his and their interconnected roles). By the end of this book, I somehow felt like I’d done a thorough cleanse, whereby that which is truly important remains and all the fluff no longer exists.
July 7, 2023
A journalist is trapped in an underwater capsized boat and has to learn to survive in a trapped air bubble while looking over his life and past regrets. The story itself will keep you on the edge, but the research this author did to write this book is wild. We are talking scuba diving/underwater survival, as well as the war over in the Middle East. Not only was I pulled into the story, but I learned a lot about underwater survival tactics. Besides the action and adventure, there’s also the themes of forgiveness and redemption that make the reader have a complicated view of the main character. Kevin Sites has created a great work of fiction that could easily be read as a true story (and even make a great film!) And also makes me grateful I am never near water.
July 7, 2023
What would you do and how would react in a confined space not of your own violation - alone with just your thoughts for company?
Kevin Sites treats all with his first foray into the fictional genre with “The Ocean Above Me”.
Deep diving into the psyche of one, Lucas Landon, a News Journalist by trade, Kevin tells the story of the shrimping vessel Philomena. Each crew member has an interesting background story which gives them characteristics to fit in to the mesh of a good crew. Lucas is there to report on their late season excursion, chasing that last haul to hopefully put them in the black.
In the mid-Atlantic in winter things happen that you would not expect.
This fast moving and well written novel will move you and make you think
Kevin Sites treats all with his first foray into the fictional genre with “The Ocean Above Me”.
Deep diving into the psyche of one, Lucas Landon, a News Journalist by trade, Kevin tells the story of the shrimping vessel Philomena. Each crew member has an interesting background story which gives them characteristics to fit in to the mesh of a good crew. Lucas is there to report on their late season excursion, chasing that last haul to hopefully put them in the black.
In the mid-Atlantic in winter things happen that you would not expect.
This fast moving and well written novel will move you and make you think
November 16, 2023
i take back what i said before in my reading progress update, this could not be farther from military propaganda. if anything, it’s the kind of book we need—a story that deals with harsh historical and political realities through the lens of fiction.
books rarely make me cry and this one not only made me cry but made me reflect on my own life in a way i haven’t in a long, long time. the ending took my breath away. i’ll be thinking about this one for a while.
i could never have imagined that a book that started out feeling like it would be a mediocre 3-star would so quickly evolve into a heartwrenching 5-star read with such strong emotional resonance.
an easy 5 stars, would give it more if i could
books rarely make me cry and this one not only made me cry but made me reflect on my own life in a way i haven’t in a long, long time. the ending took my breath away. i’ll be thinking about this one for a while.
i could never have imagined that a book that started out feeling like it would be a mediocre 3-star would so quickly evolve into a heartwrenching 5-star read with such strong emotional resonance.
an easy 5 stars, would give it more if i could
January 29, 2024
Kevin Sites is an award-winning journalist who published three nonfiction books using his expertise as a war correspondent prior to the release of this one, but this is his debut work of fiction. The novel follows Lukas Landon, a former war correspondent who takes a job aboard the shrimping trawler, Philomena, in order to write a piece about the crew. After a terrifying storm, Landon finds himself inside the vessel at the bottom of the ocean, fighting to stay alive within his little air pocket that developed around him when the ship overturned and sank. Continue Reading at https://libgirlbooks.com.
March 30, 2024
I've got to admit I had some reluctance when it came to reading this book. The thought of being trapped under water makes me anxious and --well, I'm having trouble putting this in words ... however, I thought I'd approach "The Ocean Above Me" by reading a chapter of it and then a chapter of something lighter ... just to mix it up.
In the end, that is not the approach I took. I found "The Ocean Above Me" to be gripping from start to finish and it was hard to put down.
(If I had reluctance when it came to reading this book then why did I read it at all? I've read Kevin Site's other books and found this one by Googling to see if he'd written anything new. I was very happy to find he'd turned out a novel.)
In the end, that is not the approach I took. I found "The Ocean Above Me" to be gripping from start to finish and it was hard to put down.
(If I had reluctance when it came to reading this book then why did I read it at all? I've read Kevin Site's other books and found this one by Googling to see if he'd written anything new. I was very happy to find he'd turned out a novel.)
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