No One Aboard by Emy McGuire
Author Interview + Book & Author Info + Author Pet Corner!
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No One Aboard
The White Lotus meets The Last Thing He Told Me in this domestic mystery about a luxury sailboat found floating adrift in the ocean and the secrets of the missing family who set sail aboard it weeks before…
“No One Aboard is a riveting, astonishing debut, and Emy McGuire is an important new voice in fiction. I will read anything she writes!”
—Sarah Pekkanen, #1 New York Times bestselling author
At the start of summer, billionaire couple Francis and Lila Cameron set off on their private luxury sailboat to celebrate the high school graduation of their two beloved children.
Three weeks later, the Camerons have not been heard from, the captain hasn’t responded to radio calls, and the sailboat is found floating off the coast of Florida.
Empty.
Where are the Camerons? What happened on their trip? And what secrets does the beautiful boat hold?
Set over the course of their vacation and in the aftermath of the sailboat’s discovery, No One Aboard asks who is more dangerous to a family: a stormy ocean or each other?
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No One Aboard Interview with Emy McGuire
No One Aboard focuses on an uber-wealthy family missing at sea. What drew you to that socio-economic status for your missing characters?
I knew as soon as I got the idea that it required a family who owned a yacht, which automatically put them into a certain economic bracket.
I liked the contrast of a humble fisherman stumbling upon this boat, the kind of thing that would change a person’s life to own. This immediately sets up a thematic conflict of luxury: who deserves it, who doesn’t have it, and what is done with it that turns the story into a tragedy.
No One Aboard takes place at sea, somewhere you feel right at home. Tell us about your relationship with the ocean and how that informed your debut novel.
To be honest, the ocean has always been one of my greatest fears. I think a part of us as human beings is drawn to what scares us, fascinated by the thing that drags us from our comfort zone.
I studied abroad on a sailboat sailing from Rome to Antigua in the Fall of 2022. At the time, this was the most frightening thing I had ever done. I lay awake most nights, paralyzed by the rocking of the boat. I trained myself how to get out of panic attacks. I got certified in rescue scuba diving. The ocean changed my life, and over the ninety days, it became my home.
I didn’t dream for quite some time when I first boarded the sailboat. The crew said there are such things as “boat dreams” that mean more because they happen on the water. We were crossing the Atlantic when I had one of my first boat dreams about twin children gone missing from their family’s yacht.
Tell us about your road to publication with No One Aboard:
I signed with my literary agent when I was a junior in high school. Starting young has made my journey incredibly spastic. I found myself suddenly part of an industry that I did not understand, and I felt immense pressure from my own naïve expectations on how that journey was supposed to go.
I started out as a YA fantasy author, but as I grew up over the first six years with my agent, I finally hit my stride with No One Aboard. I got “the call” from my agent one day when I was home from an acting tour, and I knew in that moment that my entire life would change.
No One Aboard combines a locked-room mystery with psychological suspense. Does your debut novel reflect your reading habits? Who are some of the authors and what are some of the books who have inspired you:
Yes and no! I certainly read a lot of thrillers, some of my favorites including: The Silent Patient by Alex Michaelides, The Only One Left by Riley Sager, and The Couple Next Door by Shari Lapena.
But my favorite books of all time are always in different genres such as Glorious Exploits by Ferdia Lennon, Such a Fun Age by Kiley Reid, and The Night Ship by Jess Kidd, (historical fiction, literary, historical fiction, respectively). I think that the mix adds a fantastical flavor to my own work, raising the stakes and providing my characters with an almost legendary status in a contemporary world.
In addition to writing novels, you are an actor and a playwright. How has theater impacted your novel writing (and vice versa):
The theatre has been instrumental in building my different storytelling lenses.
When I play a character, I get to focus on the story through their eyes, vs when I am the author or the playwright and in charge of every element. As an actor, I tackle every role by doing copious amounts of writing (journaling in character, jotting down alternate realties and what happens to the character before during and after the show).
As an author, this practice allows me to really fit into different minds. I also end up dressing up as my characters and adopting their mannerisms! It helps make these deeply-flawed people I have created more understandable and within reach.
What are you working on now?
While waiting for edits from my publisher on book two (a simmeringly sinister thriller that will be coming out roughly a year from now), I have been revising a fantasy novel that I’m very excited about.
I hope readers will someday know me as both a mystery and fantasy author. I am also working on creating a cast album for my sapphic pirate musical that has been gaining traction on TikTok (@emymcguire) and Instagram (@thelegendannebonny).
Words of Wisdom for Aspiring Writers:
Treat yourself and your dreams as though they are inevitable, and everything in you will eventually orient itself to make it that way.
Excellent Advice!
Author Pet Corner!
Sundae Monday McGuire is a professional guard dog, poop devourer, love sponge, and fuzzy muse. She was rescued in 2014, and has decided to pay it forward by rescuing the McGuire family from every mailman, solicitor, and passing mammal.
Her proudest accomplishment is the great Christmas Stocking debacle of 2022 in which she ate an entire box of Emy’s See’s Candies Chocolates and didn’t even throw up a little.
No One Aboard Author Emily McGuire
Emy McGuire is a professional author, actor, playwright, and pirate.
Her sapphic pirate musical, The Legend of Anne Bonny, has been a finalist for the SHE NYC Arts Festival and was produced in Colorado and Florida.
Emy has sailed across the Atlantic Ocean, portrayed Queen Elizabeth I at multiple Renaissance Festivals, and toured the states in the Edgar Allan Poe Speakeasy after getting her bachelor’s in theatre and writing at New College of Florida.
You can find more of her work through Dramallama and HarperCollins. No One Aboard is her debut novel.
