The Summer We Found Everything
By Mike Anthony
Available now on Kindle
About the Book
A cedar box. A pirate ancestor. A family secret buried for nearly three hundred years.
Morehead City, North Carolina. Summer, 1977.
Twelve-year-old Dondi Smythwick has a few simple goals: beat his brother to the best crabbing spot, keep the club together, and make the summer last as long as possible.
And maybe figure out why there's an empty chair at the dinner table that nobody—not even Mom—will explain.
Then he finds the box.
Hidden in his mother's closet for as long as he can remember, the old cedar box holds a name nearly three centuries old: Jonathan Smythwick. Pirate. Ancestor.
A man who sailed under the black flag off the Carolina coast. A man who fell in love with a woman named Tsula who should have been his enemy. And a man who left something behind that generations of Smythwicks somehow forgot to go looking for.
Until now.
Dondi expects buried treasure—the pirate-movie kind, with a chest full of gold waiting at the end of a map. What he finds instead is a mystery that reaches from library archives and forgotten family records to marsh mud, coastal waters, and secrets that have survived for generations.
And once Dondi and his friends start digging, they can't stop.
Every clue pulls them deeper into Jonathan's story. Every answer raises another question. And Dondi slowly discovers that some secrets were buried for a reason—and some things passed down through a family are worth far more than gold.
If you grew up with The Goonies, The Sandlot, or Stand by Me, you know this kind of summer: no cell phones, no adults hovering nearby, a pack of friends who would follow each other almost anywhere, and a mystery far too big for kids to be chasing on their own.
Told across two timelines—a pirate running from the law off the Carolina coast in the early eighteenth century and a brotherhood of boys running out of summer in 1977—the stories draw closer with every discovery until Dondi realizes that the past isn't just history.
It's unfinished business.
THE SUMMER WE FOUND EVERYTHING is a coastal coming-of-age adventure about friendship, brothers, first discoveries, family secrets, and the stories we inherit without ever knowing they're ours. It's a treasure hunt with the adventure of The Goonies, the friendship and summer freedom of The Sandlot, and the bittersweet nostalgia of Stand by Me—with a pirate ship waiting somewhere in the fog.
Perfect for readers who love:
• Middle-grade and young-YA adventure
• Pirates, buried treasure, and historical mysteries
• Dual-timeline historical fiction
• 1970s coming-of-age stories
• Treasure-hunt adventures
• Family secrets and forgotten inheritances
• North Carolina coastal settings
• Brothers, best friends, and unforgettable summers
Written for readers 10 and up, THE SUMMER WE FOUND EVERYTHING is also for adults who remember what summer once felt like—crabbing at low tide, disappearing with friends until dinner, chasing mysteries that seemed enormous, and hearing family stories that somehow never had an ending.
Some summers you remember. Some summers change everything.
A Morehead City adventure and family mystery
This Mike Anthony novel connects a Morehead City discovery, a cedar box, a pirate ancestor, and a family secret. Readers looking for Crystal Coast adventure fiction can explore it separately from the author’s crime thrillers and apocalypse novels. The coastal-fiction guide explains those distinctions.
Available Formats
Book at a Glance
- Author
- Mike Anthony
- Category
- Fiction
- Release
- Available now on Kindle
- Editions
- Kindle
Reader Questions
Who is the author of The Summer We Found Everything?
The Summer We Found Everything is by Mike Anthony, the pen name of Dr. Dondi M. Day.
When will The Summer We Found Everything be available?
The Summer We Found Everything: Available now on Kindle. A specific publication date has not been announced.