Learning to Swim

Sara Henry's debut novel Learning to Swim grabbed me from the first page. Troy Chance sees a bundle being thrown over the side of a ferry. Although she isn't sure, she jumps in to rescue what she believes is a little boy. After the heroic rescue (where Troy really does rescue a young boy), Troy takes Paul home with her, not calling law enforcement. Somehow Troy decides to find out on her own what happened to Paul and who threw him overboard. Although Paul, who speaks French, eventually tells Troy what he knows of his family, she is reluctant to return him, unsure of the type of parents he has who would let their son be put in harm's way. After doing some searching on the internet Troy decides to meet Paul's father for herself, and then decide how she will proceed.

While this story could have been neatly tied up at this point, there are many more twists that Henry creates. Paul's father does care about his son and is elated to have him back. He invites Troy into his home as Paul transitions back into "normal" life. While there, Troy decides to do a bit more investigating, trying to learn about Paul's mother who she believes was kidnapped along with Paul and then killed.

There were so many things I enjoyed about this story. I liked the Lake Placid setting with a portion of the book taking place in Canada. As a person from the midwest I like hearing about this area of our country and how close and convenient trips across the border are. I liked Troy as a character. Although she did some rather improbable things- like not alerting law enforcement when she rescued Paul, Henry was still able to develop Troy as a believable character. Henry also allowed there to be enough suspense in this book to make me want to keep reading. In fact, I had a hard time setting this book aside, and spent my lunch yesterday reading by myself.

Learning to Swim ends in such a way that there is potential for more to happen in Troy's life. While I doubt there is any sequel - the mystery in this novel was neatly tied up - I could see Troy in a mystery series and would happily read more of Sara Henry's work.