The last time Jerry Farnham sat down to write about the Finn family, he already knew he was saying goodbye. The Boothbay Harbor native had spent years building a fictional version of his hometown — a working waterfront of lobster boats, family loyalties, and the kind of trouble that washes in with the tide — and by the time he finished "First Light," the third book in his "Red at Night" series, he could feel the story reaching its natural end.
"I already had it in my mind that I couldn't do anything more with these characters," Farnham told the Boothbay Register. "They've dealt with human trafficking, drug smuggling, high speed gun chases. And I'm like, you know, if I do anything else crazy, or too much crazy after 'Last Light,' I'm jumping the shark. So I decided I needed to end these characters where they ended up and be happy with it."
That ending arrives this fall with "Last Light," the fourth and final installment, and Farnham is bringing the party home. On Saturday, Oct. 3, at 4 p.m., Brady's Restaurant at 25 Union Street will host "Last Light with Maine's Blue-Collar Author," an afternoon of book signing, live music, and what the event promises will be appearances by some of the "local" characters from the novels. Guests are encouraged to buy their copies in advance through Sherman's Books, Amazon, or the author's website, since only a limited number will be on hand at the restaurant.
For Farnham, the setting is the point. The books are set in Boothbay Harbor, and the launch is happening in Boothbay Harbor, at a restaurant that has become a fixture on the town's dining scene. It is a homecoming dressed up as a book release — a chance for readers who have followed Jack Finn and Melissa Andrews through four novels to meet the man who invented them, in the town that gave the stories their salt air and their grit.
Farnham's own biography reads like research for the books. He grew up in Boothbay Harbor and worked on his father's lobster boat beginning at the age of six, according to his publisher biography. He went on to serve in the U.S. Navy, then spent several years as a boat diesel engine mechanic before settling in southern Maine with his wife and two children. The working-waterfront detail that reviewers consistently single out — the accuracy of the boats, the rhythms of the harbor, the texture of a lobstering life — is not something he had to look up.
The series began in 2015, when Farnham started writing what would become "Red at Night." It took six years to reach print; the first book was published on Nov. 4, 2021, by Bookbaby. The premise was a classic collision of worlds: a Hollywood actress named Melissa Andrews escapes to Maine and is rescued by a lobsterman named Jack Finn, and the two have to navigate the suspicions of a small town, the pull of their old lives, and a local drug dealer who complicates everything. It was, by the account of one Goodreads reviewer, "a love letter to the lobstering culture and life in Boothbay Harbor, Maine," even as another reader found the local references and hometown locations heavy-handed. The series has not been universally adored, but it has found a devoted readership — the kind that shows up at a restaurant on an October afternoon to get a book signed.
What followed the first novel grew steadily more ambitious. "Red in the Morning" raised the stakes with a drug smuggling operation with international ties and the death of the family patriarch, Russell Finn, before ending on a note of hard-won joy: the birth of Jack and Melissa's son. "First Light" stepped backward, filling in the characters' backstories in response to readers who wanted to know what made them tick. And "Last Light" picks up four years after "Red in the Morning," with Jack and Melissa now parents of two children, adjusting to a life that Melissa's Hollywood roles never prepared her for.
Farnham has described the finale as a blend of mystery, romance, and "the unmistakable humor and grit of coastal Maine," with comical moments and heartbreaking twists woven together as long-seeded storylines finally pay off. He has also been candid that the decision to stop was deliberate rather than forced. "I decided I needed to end these characters where they ended up and be happy with it," he said.
The evening's entertainment fits the mood. Brett Slater, a popular Midcoast acoustic guitarist and vocalist, will play folk, rock, and singer-songwriter material spanning the 1960s to the present, with a little "yacht rock" mixed in, along with song parodies and what the event billing describes as "wildly popular dad jokes." It is a lineup calibrated for a hometown crowd rather than a literary salon — which is, presumably, exactly the point of calling Farnham "Maine's blue-collar author."
The event is free to attend, though the book is not; attendees who want a signed copy are advised to bring one with them. Brady's, which serves classic American cuisine and sits a short walk from the harbor, keeps Saturday hours from 11:30 a.m. to 8 p.m., so the 4 p.m. start lands comfortably in the afternoon. The restaurant has built a following partly on seasonal traffic — it markets itself to visitors in town for Boothbay Lights and Gardens Aglow — but an October book launch is a different kind of gathering, more neighborhood than tourist.
There is something quietly fitting about a series that spent four books mapping a fictional Boothbay Harbor onto the real one, ending with a party in the real one. Farnham started writing the Finn family in 2015, published them in 2021, and now, more than a decade after he first imagined them, he is bringing them back to the streets and wharves that inspired them. Readers who have followed Jack and Melissa from a rescue on the water to parenthood and a boatyard will get their answers. Farnham will get to watch them find out. And the town that lent the books its name gets one more chapter — this time with dad jokes.