Sand Dollar

Sebastian Cole’s debut romance novel, Sand Dollar: A Story of Undying Love (2012), follows Noah Hartman, a trust fund baby who is to inherit his family’s fortune. Noah has it all, but his controlling parents have left him unsure how to battle his internal struggles and uncertain of who he is on the outside. Noah soon meets Robin, his polar opposite. Free-spirited, wild, and certain of herself, she has no material possessions. As Noah and Robin fall in love, Noah feels confident enough to stand up to his parents and become his own person. However, Robin has a secret, and it might be large enough to ruin the love that she and Noah have built so carefully together.

The novel is framed as eighty-year-old Noah Hartman’s recollection from his hospital bed at Mount Sinai. He is telling the story of his life to Josh, a kind orderly who sits by his bed and listens to him recollect the tumultuous story of his love. As Noah remembers his younger years, the reader is thrown back to Noah’s life at thirty-five years old, the soon-to-be heir of his family’s fortune.

Noah seems to have it all—he is wealthy, with promising business prospects from his parents, who built their empire from the ground up. But inside, Noah is lost and uncertain, feeling that he isn't in charge of his own life. Controlling and manipulative, his parents use his inheritance as a tool to encourage Noah to follow the plan they have outlined for his life. Though Noah doesn't want to live this way, he has always imagined himself running the family business. Without that achievement, his life seems even more meaningless.



Robin arrives on the scene, shaking up Noah's world. Ten years younger than him, she is a vivacious and bright free spirit. She falls in love with Noah immediately, and with her as his guide, Noah finally finds the strength to tell his parents that his life is his choice. Robin inspires Noah to give up everything—his wealth and his future—to be himself. Soon after he stands up to his parents, Robin and Noah get married.

On their honeymoon, they go snorkeling in the Caribbean. Noah is instructed not to touch the sand dollars on the seafloor, but he can't resist; diving down and grasping one, he is startled and horrified when it bursts into dust in his hands. When he returns to the shore, Robin is distant; soon after they return home, she disappears without a trace. Devastated and confused, Noah grieves over the one who got away.

After healing for some time, Noah finds another partner, Sarah, whom he meets at the premiere of the film Sand Dollar, which he wrote about his time with Robin. Robin sees the film, finding in it a clue about Noah’s upcoming wedding. Sarah appears at the alter on Noah and Sarah’s wedding. She wants him back, but Noah has found someone else to share his life.



As the novel ends, Robin and Sarah are both in the hospital room. But it is anyone's guess which love won out, in the end.

Cole, a novelist and former businessman from Rhode Island, graduated from Brown University and worked in New York before returning home to take over his family’s business. After working for nineteen years in business, he left work to write Sand Dollar. Cole cites Nicholas Sparks as his favorite author and inspiration for writing. Sand Dollar won a number of awards, including a Beverly Hills Book Award, a bronze Foreword Reviews Book of The Year Award, and a silver Feathered Quill Book Award.