"Warm, smart coming-of-age with a cause worth fighting for ... direct and winning from the first page" - BookLife (Publishers Weekly) "A resourceful teenager comes into her own... in the affecting novel Too Deep to Drown." - Foreword Clarion Reviews (4/5) "Ward is an adept storyteller who creates, in Meg, a complex, layered character with an authentic teenage voice." - BlueInk Review (starred) "Atmospheric, emotionally astute, and quietly powerful... What ultimately distinguishes the book is the balance it achieves between personal reckoning and environmental awareness." - Prairie's Book Review "a powerful exploration of agency and determination in the face of social and institutional powerlessness. With its vivid ocean setting, emotional honesty, and celebration of perseverance, it offers both inspiration and a reminder that meaningful dreams are rarely easy-but always worth the fight." - The Children's Book Review "At the heart of the story is homegrown mechanic Meg Pullman, a newly emancipated seventeen-year-old fresh off the beaten path of a broken life. Given the chance to test her sea legs in order to earn university credits, Meg boards the research vessel Sojourner as a rookie intern... "Add to the mix a drill-sergeant aunt who monitors Meg's every move, a boisterous roommate who playfully brings her into the fold, a mysterious humpback whale who haunts her dreams, and a handsome crew member who gives her feelings she can't articulate... "The book will engage readers of all ages." - Indie Reader (4.8/5 Stars) - At seventeen, Meg Pullman has cut ties with her past. Emancipated and determined, she signs on as an intern in the engine room of a research vessel, certain the wide blue horizon will lead her toward the scholarship and freedom she craves. But the Pacific Ocean isn't the escape she imagined. Its beauty is haunted by the cries of a polluted world. Ghost nets and floating trash islands echo her own buried pain. When a humpback whale and an unexpected romantic entanglement force Meg to confront both the ocean's wounds and her own, she discovers that true survival isn't about outswimming the current. It's about surrender. And sometimes, to survive, you don't fight the waves. You let go.