For the first three-quarters of the book, Cottage by the Sea by Debbie Macomber was the gentle, reassuring romance I needed. Near the end I struggled with the treatment of a secondary character who suffers from mental health issues enough that it soured the book a bit for me. It still enjoyed it, but that short section frustrated me enough that it disrupted the overall romance.

The book opens after tragedy strikes. Annie Marlow, a physician’s assistant living in LA, loses her entire family in an unexpected accident. Suddenly she’s grieving for her parents, her brother and sister-in-law, and her infant niece. Annie is going through the motions, not really living, when her therapist suggests she go to the place where she remembers being happiest.

That place is Oceanside, Washington, a beachside community where Annie’s family vacationed when she was a kid. Annie moves to Oceanside and gets a job in their small clinic. Unable to help herself, she finds solace in helping others.

This book deals with a lot of heavy themes: domestic abuse, mental illness, survivor’s guilt, and profound grief. Almost as soon as she settles in Oceanside, Annie finds people to “rescue.” This includes her landlady, Mellie, a woman with agoraphobia who hasn’t left her house in years.

She also meets Seth Keaton, a local painter who has few friends and rarely speaks. Keaton remembers Annie from her teenage summers spent with her family at Oceanside. He developed a crush on her as a teen, and when she returns to town he’s surprised to find himself still very much infatuated with her.

Keaton is a bit of recluse. He’s large enough that he intimidates most people, but he’s really a gentle giant. He spends most of his spare time rescusing and rehabilitating stray and abused animals. Keaton is a beta hero, and I adored his kind, gentle energy. I’m a sucker for a gentle giant hero (Reader, I married one), and Keaton’s tenderness won me over immediately.

There’s a scene where Annie has a breakdown on the beach. Keaton is walking by with his dog and even through he doesn’t know why Annie is in such pain, he knows how to show her the kindness she needs in that moment:

When the big dog caught sight of her, Lennon sprinted ahead, kicking up sand in his wake, heading straight to her. If she didn’t know the dog, she would have been alarmed. He stopped directly in front of her, panting hard. Annie circled her arms around his neck and buried her face in his fur.

Keaton was several feet behind his companion but caught up to Lennon in short order.

Annie looked up at him as he approached, certain her red eyes spoke of her anguish.

Without speaking, Keaton sank down on the sand, sitting next to her, his presence surrounding her, reminding her he that he was a giant of a man.

He didn’t ask questions.

Didn’t strike up a conversation.

Didn’t comment.

He simply sat at her side, giving Annie the comfort of his silent strength. His warmth seeped into her, chasing away the chill. Lennon went to the opposite side of Annie and sank down, resting his head in her lap.

Annie petted his thick fur, gliding her splayed fingers through his coat.

After a few minutes, Keaton surprised her and reached for her free hand, entwining their fingers.

Annie thought for a minute that she should explain what had caused this emotional breakdown, but she couldn’t find the words. To say it was her mother’s birthday explained nothing. Offering excuses was beyond her.

Keaton was a man of few words. Until they’d met she hadn’t realized how much could be said through silence. He didn’t need words to communicate, and in the moment, Annie discovered that she didn’t, either.

I love, love this scene. I crave heroes who offer comfort and gentleness, not alpha heroes who “take charge.” More and more I find myself looking for heroes who are truly empathetic and who communicate love by giving the heroine the space she needs, rather than fixing things for her.

In fact, Annie is the fixer in this book; she helps a woman in an abusive relationship, befriends Mellie (despite Mellie’s initial resistance) and assists a teenager who becomes pregnant. I could see the criticism being made that Annie was meddling (in fact she does get in trouble at work for violating patient privacy) or that the solutions to some of these issues were too “easy” and didn’t give them the appropriate gravity. It didn’t bother me as a reader though because I found the theme of simple acts of kindness and consideration having a big impact to be very soothing and uplifting.

As Annie becomes more a part of the community of Oceanside, she also starts seeing Keaton romantically. Their relationship progresses slowly, and if you’re looking for books with low sexual content, this one will fit the bill.

The one scene that did really bother me involved Mellie. Mellie hasn’t left her house in years and she’s hoarded her late grandparents’ belongings to the point where there are very few livable spaces in the house.

Mellie does help Keaton and his best friend, Preston, rehabilitate sick animals, though, and Preston has been in love with her for years. At one point Preston and Mellie have a falling out and he demands she step into her yard to prove to him that she’s really in love with him.

This bothered me a lot. Mellie needs mental healthcare. I felt that her agoraphobia and hoarding were treated more or less as her “not moving on” from past trauma, rather than symptoms of a more profound mental illness. Preston’s demand that Mellie leave the house to “prove” her love isn’t giving her mental health issues the consideration they deserve and quite honestly, it’s just shitty.

I was just so frustrated by the dismissal of a serious mental illness that it impacted my grading considerably. I loved the warmth and kindness that infused the rest of this book, and I adored the hero, but I couldn’t get past that one scene. As it was, with all the awfulness going on, I wanted a few simple acts of kindness to solve awful things, and this story was a welcome respite.