A novel with characters we can care about

Book cover of Red Ruby Heart In A Cold Blue Sea. Morgan Callan Rogers will draw you in with her characters. Photo / Supplied

Coming-of-age debut novel has strengths that impress Nicky Pellegrino.

There are times when it seems every other novel I read is a coming-of-age story. I certainly don't go looking for them so they must somehow find me. But I'm glad Red Ruby Heart In A Cold Blue Sea (Text, $37) made its way to me.

This debut novel by United States writer Morgan Callan Rogers is a beautiful book, set in the 1960s, with a mystery at its core and a flawed and feisty heroine roaring from every page.

Florine Gilham is a lobsterman's daughter whose childhood in a village on the coast of Maine is idyllic. She runs wild with her friends, bakes cookies with her grandmother and hangs out at the beach with her pretty young mother, Carlie.

Then Carlie disappears while on holiday with a friend and her family is left to struggle with the grief that fills the gap she's left behind. Florine's father loses himself in drinking, while the child lives in hope her mother will be found.

"We've got to get on with things," the pair tell each other. But Florine isn't about to get on with the new woman pushing her way into her father's life and her rebellion is both spirited and heartbreaking.

There's a lot of sadness and loss running through this book but it's tempered by decent honest humour and by the joy of Florine's friendships. There's her gruff friend Dottie, her Grand, who's always full of wisdom, and Bud, the sweet boy who lets her cry on his shoulder. This is very much an ensemble piece with a cast of wonderful characters. They're people you can come to care about. Their reactions and emotions seem real.

In Germany half a million copies of this book have been sold so far. It's an easy read - often that's a term used in a pejorative sense but from me it's high praise. I think it a huge achievement to write a book in which readers can disappear as thoroughly as I did I felt the emotions, reeled from every setback Florine suffered, cried and laughed through the rollercoaster of her adolescence.

Rogers is 60 - relatively old to be publishing her first novel - but her maturity and wisdom shines through. She has a great sense of both place and people. And no one who has never suffered loss or made mistakes in her own life could write a character like Florine.

It's an accomplished debut, poignant and genuine. If you demand neat endings then this book won't deliver. But to me that's another of its assets. Not every last thing in life can be explained. Some you just have to get on with. This is the story of how Florine gets on and I loved it.