Throwbacks and Keepers

A heartfelt middle-grade novel about a boy navigating foster care who finds healing, purpose, and new family among the lobstering community of a small Maine island.

Sully loves his mom. But love doesn’t always mean safety.

After years of homelessness and uncertainty, Sully is taken from his mother and placed in foster care—thrust into an unfamiliar world with new rules and strangers who say they want to help. Inside, Sully battles two powerful forces he calls “the Sads” and “the Mads,” feelings that make it hard to trust anyone.

Then he meets Miss Millie.

Miss Millie sings while she cooks, holds daily “safety briefings,” and insists that Sully and his new foster brother Victor help with chores, go to church, and look out for each other. When the trio visits Miss Millie’s sister Aggie on Long Island, Maine, Sully discovers something unexpected: lobstering.

Out on the water before sunrise, hauling traps alongside local lobstermen, Sully feels something he hasn’t felt in a long time—like he belongs.

But just when Sully begins to believe he’s finally found a forever home, tragedy strikes again.

With the help of Victor, Aggie, and the tight-knit island community, Sully learns that family isn’t always the one you start with—it’s the one that refuses to let you go.

Weaving back and forth between the present when Sully is age twelve and the past at age seven when the world he has always known falls apart, this is a heartfelt story of resilience, belonging, and second chances. Throwbacks and Keepers is perfect for fans of Lynda Mullaly Hunt and Gary D. Schmidt.