Title: Wild Dark Shore: a Novel by Charlotte McConaghy
Book Beginnings/First Line Friday quote:
Rowan.
I have hated my mother for most of my life but it is her face I see as I drown.
Friday56 quote (page 68):
Dominic.
I am conflicted as I turn off the bike and help Rowan climb off. Half of me despises her. For existing. For being here. For being any part of a stunt which might harm my children.
Summary: Dominic Salt and his three children are caretakers of Shearwater, a tiny island not far from Antarctica. The island is home to the world's largest seed bank, and was once full of researchers. But now the sea levels are rising and the Salts are the final inhabitants. Until, during a terrible storm, a woman mysteriously washes ashore. As the family helps nurse the woman back to health they discover she is keeping secrets from them. But that is okay since they are keeping secrets from her, too.
Review: Wild Dark Shore has a lot going on. Let's see if I can begin to explain the complexity of this story.
First, there is the message of climate change and a rising sea level. Shearwater Island, an imaginary place patterned after an actual Australian research spot, Macquarie Island, is home to the world's seed bank. Saving seeds in case we need them in the future due to rising temperatures and other catastrophic climate events. But now Shearwater is becoming a victim of what researchers were using the island to research. Soon the island will be under the sea and the seeds, if they can be saved, will need to be relocated elsewhere.
Secondly, there is the Salt family -- Dominic, the father, and his three children: Raff, Fen, and Orly. Dominic is the caretaker of the island and has lived on it for eight years, moving in soon after the death of his wife to cancer. The family is set to leave the island in six weeks and had hoped to help the last of the researchers pack up the seeds, preparing them for transport, but none of the researchers survived and someone cut the radio and any communication systems the island had to communicate with the outside world.
A mysterious woman, Rowan, washes ashore which throws everything into turmoil. How did she get to the island and why? It is an out of the way place, one would have to be aiming for the island to find it. Since communications are down, she is forced to live with the family and wait to be rescued along with the Salts. But in the meantime, she start snooping around to see if she can find her husband, a lead researcher on the island. Where did the researchers go? Who is buried in the newly dug graves? And why do the Salts all seems to be tangled up in some emotional mess, possibly connected to ghosts? As Rowan draws close to the family, and they to her, there seems to be a possible moment where a new family could be formed.
The mysteries of the island don't seem willing to unlock themselves until the last twenty pages or so of the text and then everything comes rushing out in a gush. I had to put the book down. It was too much to take in all at once. Wow. What an impactful book.
I have to admit I was a little frustrated with the book. There were so many mysteries one almost felt like they had to juggle all the details and be careful not to drop a ball along the way. The story is dribbled out by the five narrators. Each chapter narrated by one person. Both Dominic's and Rowan's chapters were told in first person (note the excerpts above). Talk about confusing. The other three narrators got their point of view expressed in third person, which wasn't as confusing. My favorite narrator was Oly, the nine-year-old boy, who had lived nearly his whole life on the island, and had spent his time soaking in all he could about science from hanging around the researchers. He knew so much about the seeds and where they were from and what kind of plants they grew. I found his chapters fascinating.
I think the book asks some really hard questions. Among them, the age old one: How then shall we live? The Salts were really struggling with decisions about the future. After Shearwater, with its rugged, pristine isolation, where would they fit in the world? I imagine many people will ask themselves this same question in our near future. Where will they fit when their homeland is no longer habitable?
Lots of questions. Few answers.
My rating: 4.25 stars.
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