Fathoms: A Seaside Monster Murder Mystery Novel (Paperback) (ISBN-13: 9798998749513)

Ellis Ward is no detective.

His father was, until dear old dad forgot his own mantra and went in the East Hook water to save a kid, and didn't come back out. Ellis is an artist, art student really, one painting away from graduating into a future as foggy as his hometown, a longstanding Maine seaside tourist stop famous for its mostly fictitious history of monsters and shipwrecks. But when he goes back home for his friend's funeral, things are too strange to ignore.

Animals keep dropping dead all around him, and someone is using the thick, ever-present mist to vandalize local landmarks. His old friends are partying with harder drugs than he remembers, and hanging with people wearing prosthetic shrimp pincers in their mouths. But he can't leave home and finish his last painting, as his art keeps popping up in connection to the vandals, even linking him to his friend's death. Ellis has to channel his father and figure out what is really going on in the water off of East Hook, without meeting the same end.

Early Praise for FATHOMS:

"KJ McQuade's FATHOMS pulls us under with an atmosphere so rich you can taste the salt on your tongue. Through fogbound mystery, aching grief, and brushstroke-level detail, McQuade renders a coastal town haunted by more than just the past. It's a story about monsters-both the ones we imagine and the ones we try not to-but also about art, memory, and how we keep each other afloat. A stunning, deeply human debut."

- J3ss, author, "The Friends of Stevie Derstler"

"KJ MCQUADE HAS PLUMBED THE DEPTHS OF OUR MONSTROUS PSYCHES WITH FATHOMS. PART SEATOWN NOIR, PART CRIME THRILLER, PART COMING-OF-AGE DRAMA, MCQUADE'S DEBUT NOVEL SCOURS THE RUGGED COASTLINE OF EAST HOOK AS IT IGNITES THE MYSTERY AND ANGUISH OF THE VIVID CHARACTERS WHO CALL IT HOME. BE CAREFUL--IN EVERY WORD, IN EVERY WAVE, IN EVERY STROKE OF A BRUSH, THERE BE MONSTERS..."

- Clark Young, playwright, "Remember This: A Lesson with Jan Karski"