Beyond That, the Sea

Fiction | Novel | Adult | Published in 2023

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Summary

Background

Chapter Summaries & Analyses

Prologue-Part 1, Chapter 27

Part 1, Chapters 28-55

Part 2

Part 3, Chapters 70-86

Part 3, Chapter 87-Epilogue

Character Analysis

Themes

Symbols & Motifs

Important Quotes

Essay Topics

Book Club Questions

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Discussion Questions

Themes

Reconciling the Parts of One’s Identity

Beyond That, the Sea follows the story of two families on two different continents, separated by the sea but united in their love for one person: Beatrix. She spends part of her childhood with the Gregorys in the US, sent there by her own parents to protect her during the war, and these years prove formative and significant. She forms a lasting link with the family and the country, and even after she returns home to London, she struggles to reconcile her identity as shaped by her time in the US. This becomes one of the novel’s central themes.

Although the circumstances under which Beatrix goes to the US aren’t pleasant, she experiences some of the happiest times of her life with the Gregorys. She’s immediately taken in by Gerald and Nancy’s warmth and openness, smiling at Gerald’s welcome on the dock and allowing Nancy to give her a bath that same evening. Bea forms unique and special bonds with each member of the Gregory family: Ethan teaches her how to swim and play chess, she and Nancy have their special bath-time ritual every night for years, and both William and Gerald are her close friends and confidants, her relationship with William eventually even developing into a romance. However, Bea also experiences significant guilt at the happiness she feels in the US. She omits details in her letters home about her comfort with the Gregorys, though her parents can sense it when they talk to her on the phone. Thus, when Bea faces the reality that she must return to England, despite the disappointment, she quickly accepts that her time with the Gregorys is only a temporary reprieve from her life in London.

Once Bea returns to London, her relationship with Millie remains strained and complicated, partly because of Bea’s time in the US. She experiences Millie’s disapproval whenever she talks about the Gregorys and is forced to push them into the recesses of her memory. Millie, similarly, can’t connect with the young woman who has returned in place of her child. Over many years, the mother and daughter repair their relationship and eventually feel comfortable with each other, and this occurs only once Millie accepts how formative the US and the Gregorys were in Bea’s life. Millie finally acknowledges and accepts Nancy’s love for Bea and acknowledges that sending her to the US was a good thing. This prompts a mother-daughter trip to the US, as well as efforts on Millie’s part to communicate with Nancy.

Bea finally visits the US and the Gregorys with Millie’s support and insistence, and this allows her to reconnect with people who were fundamental to her upbringing. She makes peace with the dual impact of both England and the US on her identity, and this inner reconciliation is reflected in her rekindling and deepening her relationship with Gerald and eventually making the US her home in a different way than she originally envisioned. Thus, the novel’s Epilogue features the realization of Bea’s wish that she expresses in the Prologue: “to stay. To be with them all, forever” (6).

The Gap Between Dreams and Reality

Bea’s relationship with both the Gregory brothers and the course of each of their lives explore the gap between dreams and reality. Bea is fond of both brothers from the beginning, but she looks up to the older and seemingly more capable William. He has big dreams and plans for his life, yearning to do something important and independent. He looks to break away from the family in multiple ways, from not wanting to go to Maine for the summer, to aspiring to attend Columbia or Yale—anything but Harvard, which is the family legacy. Bea is captivated by William’s passion, and when he reciprocates her feelings, she’s understandably thrilled. The two embark on a secret romantic relationship during her final summer in the US.

The timing and nature of William and Bea’s relationship are significant: Not only does an imminent end to their affair loom, but it also isn’t meant to be openly acknowledged given that it can’t withstand the test of time and the real world. Their intense romantic relationship is fueled by youth, idealism, and dreams; it isn’t rooted in reality, circumstance, or even who each of them are as people. This is why Bea keeps their relationship secret until the very end since bringing it into the real world wouldn’t allow her to preserve the dream that it was. This gap between dreams and reality is exposed multiple times throughout the novel: when the two reconnect in London following Ethan’s death and again as their lives progress separately as adults.

In London, Bea and William discover that they’ve changed and moved on as people, and Bea is repeatedly struck by the mundanity of William’s life and how he appears to have settled for something far below what he originally hoped for. An air of discontent surrounds William for the entirety of his short life. Even after he marries and has two children, he clings to the past and all his unfulfilled dreams until the very end, longing for Maine, the sea, and something more exciting.

In sharp contrast, Gerald grows into a secure, self-assured man, accomplishing something meaningful with his life. He realizes his dream to live on the West Coast for a time yet returns home without complaint when he senses a need to be near Nancy as well as William’s children. Even when they aren’t in contact with each other, Bea’s and Gerald’s lives follow similar trajectories, while William’s differs dramatically. Significantly, William’s death brings Bea and Gerald back into each other’s lives and set them on the path to end up together.

At one point, Bea wonders whether Gerald could have flourished as he did if William were still alive. William’s absence allows Bea to consider the possibility of building a life with Gerald as she makes peace with the death of her first love and becomes ready to move on. William in some ways represents the discontent of unfulfilled potential; his death symbolizes the removal of unrealistic expectation: the death of a person but also a dream, which finally allows both Gerald and Bea to realize the true potential of a life together.

Relationships and the Meaning of Family

This theme emerges from the other two because their central conflicts feed into it: Bea experiences an inner struggle to reconcile the parts of her identity given that she feels like she had four parents. The gap between dreams and reality, which the novel explores through Bea’s relationship with the Gregory brothers, likewise results in a major conflict. Both conflicts lead the novel’s characters to consider the meaning of family and the tensions and dynamics inherent in them.

The story centers on Bea’s respective relationships with her birth and foster parents. The homes that she inhabits with each family differ vastly: The Gregorys live a more comfortable life than the Thompsons, with their big house in Boston, summers in Maine, and shopping sprees in New York. Millie even worries that her daughter will be disenchanted by the less fancy life she’ll eventually return to in London. The differences in Nancy’s and Millie’s appearances and personalities reflect their very different backgrounds.

Despite these differences, Bea fits into the Gregorys’ lives far more easily than she anticipated, to the point that the family and the US feel more like home than England, which Bea admits to Gerald years later. She only spends five years of her youth with the Gregorys in the US, but the impact of the place and the people on her is tremendous. It presents the question of what family truly means and to what extent it’s defined by blood ties alone versus a sense of home and belonging. Bea’s experience suggests that the latter is more significant, especially considering the depth of the relationships she forms in a relatively short span of time. Further emphasizing the importance of home and belonging, she even forgets what her birth parents look like while she’s in the US. Additionally, when she returns to London, her relationship with Millie is complicated, partly because of the choices Millie made in her life but also because of the resentment she feels about her daughter’s time in the US.

Bea’s years in the US affect more than just her relationship with Millie; they influence the dynamics between both sets of parents as well. Millie feels angry and resentful toward Reginald for having forced her to send their daughter away, increasing the distance between the husband and wife. Millie keeps the first telegram with news about Bea a secret from Reginald; in turn, he increasingly spends time away from home and doesn’t tell Millie about his communication with Ethan. Likewise, Nancy and Ethan experience some tension because of Bea’s presence despite their both loving her deeply: Ethan thinks Nancy mothers the girl too much, especially considering that Bea is someone else’s daughter and will return home one day. Nancy, in turn, believes that Ethan is jealous of her relationship with Bea.

Ultimately, the women are left to make peace in their relationships with Bea and each other since both Ethan and Reginald die early deaths. Once Millie accepts the significance of the Gregorys and the US in Bea’s life, all these dynamics turn toward resolution. Bea revisits and reconnects with the Gregorys, and her relationship with Millie improves. In addition, Millie and Nancy establish a line of communication, and Nancy even visits London to attend Millie’s fourth and final wedding.

By the end of the book, Bea makes peace with having four parents, each leaving a significant mark on who she grew up to be. This resolution is mirrored in her repaired relationship with Millie, her rekindled bond with Nancy, her new relationship with Gerald, and even her friendship with Rose (William’s widow) and their children. Thus, Bea eventually creates a family of her own that is a culmination or realization of the various parts of her life—a family that reflects all the different, important relationships she has experienced.