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A Novel
by Charlotte McConaghyAn enthralling new novel from the New York Times bestselling author of Migrations and Once There Were Wolves.
A family on a remote island. A mysterious woman washed ashore. A rising storm on the horizon.
Dominic Salt and his three children are caretakers of Shearwater, a tiny island not far from Antarctica. Home to the world's largest seed bank, Shearwater was once full of researchers, but with sea levels rising, the Salts are now its final inhabitants. Until, during the worst storm the island has ever seen, a woman mysteriously washes ashore.
Isolation has taken its toll on the Salts, but as they nurse the woman, Rowan, back to strength, it begins to feel like she might just be what they need. Rowan, long accustomed to protecting herself, starts imagining a future where she could belong to someone again.
But Rowan isn't telling the whole truth about why she set out for Shearwater. And when she discovers sabotaged radios and a freshly dug grave, she realizes Dominic is keeping his own secrets. As the storms on Shearwater gather force, they all must decide if they can trust each other enough to protect the precious seeds in their care before it's too late―and if they can finally put the tragedies of the past behind them to create something new, together.
A novel of breathtaking twists, dizzying beauty, and ferocious love, Wild Dark Shore is about the impossible choices we make to protect the people we love, even as the world around us disappears.
Rowan
I have hated my mother for most of my life but it is her face I see as I drown.
* * *
The face I see when I wake from drowning is different. It is rough and wind-bitten and scratchy. It is what I'm looking at when the sudden arrival of pain overcomes me, and I know the image of him will forever be as one with this pain. Whenever I see this face I will remember the burning sting of being dragged upon rocks and flayed open, left raw, I will feel the bursting pressure in my chest; the sensation will be so vivid it will be like it's happening all over again. His face, a return. A drowning.
Fen
She washes in with the storm, draped upon a tangle of driftwood. The girl sees her from among the seals. She picks her way through their fat sleeping bodies and moves to the surging waterline. Rough waves carry the lump closer, in with the tide. A shape of milky white lit by the moon. A shoulder, she thinks. And seaweed for hair. A hand draped delicately over wood.
The girl wades into the ...
What audience would you recommend Broken Country to? Is there another book or author you’d recommend that you feel has a similar theme or style?
Those who like a romance if it's part of a mystery with lots of twist and turns! I'm currently reading Charlotte McConaghy's Wild Dark Shore and would recommend it as being similar. It is an atmospheric, isolated Island murder mystery with a romance buried in that I'm very much enjoying! I would ...
-Jo_S
What are you reading this week? (7/2/2025)
After finishing "Wild Dark Shore" by Charlotte McConaghy, I picked up "Booth" by Karen Joy Fowler. William Kent Krueger's "Ordinary Grace" is waiting to be re-read next (all for our public library's summer reading program for adults).
-Carol_Ann_Robb
Think about your favorite genre. To you, which author is the master of that genre?
My favorite genre is Literary Fiction, and the master for me is Louise Erdrich. My second favorite genre is Climate Fiction, for which Kim Stanley Robinson is master, but Charlotte McConaghy (Wild Dark Shore, Migrations) blends the two genres well.
-Holly_Batsell
What are you reading this week? (4/17/2025)
I am reading and loving. Wild Dark Shore by Charlotte McConaghy and would highly recommend!!
-Laurie_L
What are you reading this week? (3/12/2025)
I've read 'Three Wild Dogs and the Truth' by Markus Zusak, and 'Wild Dark Shore' by Charlotte McConaghy. Very different reading experiences, both the books are very good!
-Evonne_Benedict
What are some books you loved reading in 2024?
...HE SHADOW DOCKET by Steve Vladeck and THE SING SING FILES by Dan Slepian were two informative and important reads. NIGHT SWIMMERS by Roisin Macguire, WILD DARK SHORE by Charlotte McConaghy, and THE DEVIL IS FINE were totally engaging fictional stories. Shout out to my favorite mystery/thriller writer Greg Iles for SOUTHERN MAN. WE WERE...
-Anne_Glasgow
Charlotte McConaghy's novel Wild Dark Shore is set on fictional Shearwater Island, located halfway between Tasmania and Antarctica. The frigid, wind-swept land is home to thousands of sea mammals and endangered birds, as well as a small research base, a lighthouse, and the world's largest seed bank. Water levels are rising due to global warming, however, and soon the island will disappear beneath the waves. The researchers have evacuated, leaving the caretakers, Dominic Salt and his three children, to pack up the seeds for transport before they, too, will be displaced from the land that has been their home for the past eight years. More than a slow-burn thriller, the novel has a lot to say about grief, in particular how dwelling on one's losses can damage relationships with those we care about. All the characters have experienced profound bereavement of one type or another, and the journey each takes toward healing is the beating heart of the narrative...continued
Full Review
(681 words)
(Reviewed by Kim Kovacs).
A main character in Charlotte McConaghy's novel Wild Dark Shore is employed as a caretaker for an isolated seed bank. The author has stated that the facility is based on the Svalbard Global Seed Vault, located on the remote Norwegian island of Spitsbergen, halfway between mainland Norway and the North Pole.
A seed bank's main purpose is to safeguard the planet's food supply, creating a repository that could be turned to should a disaster wipe out humanity's crops. It's believed that a well-preserved seed can stay viable for centuries. According to a 2022 article in The Guardian, there are approximately 1,700 seed banks around the world.
The first seed bank was created in St. Petersburg in the 1920s by Russian ...
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Don't join the book burners. Don't think you are going to conceal faults by concealing evidence that they ever ...
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