'Wild Dark Shore' by Charlotte McConaghy
- Reed
- Jul 17
- 3 min read
Author: Charlotte McConaghy
Rating: B+
Vibe: Remote island thriller meets climate anxiety with gorgeous prose and a heavy touch
Quick Take: A beautifully written book that achieves what it sets out to do, even if what it sets out to do occasionally feels a bit too earnest for its own good. Worth reading, but maybe temper those sky-high expectations.
I wanted to love Wild Dark Shore more than I did. After all the critical acclaim—instant bestseller, rave reviews, Amazon's pick for best book of the year so far—I went in with high expectations. And look, this is undeniably a beautiful, well-crafted book. McConaghy can write. Her prose is lush and evocative, and she creates such a vivid sense of place that I could practically feel the salt spray and see those ridiculous penguin eyebrows. But somewhere between the gorgeous nature writing and the environmental urgency, the book lost me with its heavy hand.
Wild Dark Shore is set on fictional Shearwater Island, a remote research station between Australia and Antarctica that's slowly sinking into rising seas. Dominic Salt has been the island's caretaker for eight years, raising his three children—eighteen-year-old Raff, seventeen-year-old Fen, and nine-year-old Orly—in splendid isolation among seals, penguins, and a precious seed vault meant to preserve biodiversity for a climate-ravaged future. When the researchers evacuate and the family prepares to leave in six weeks, a mysterious woman named Rowan washes ashore after a storm, bringing secrets that will test everyone's trust and survival.
What works here really works. McConaghy's nature writing is genuinely stunning—I felt transported to that windswept island, could see the abundant wildlife, could feel the claustrophobia of being trapped with the same people as storms rage outside. The multiple perspectives give each character distinct voices, and there are some genuinely surprising twists that kept me turning pages. The atmosphere is thick and immersive, and when McConaghy focuses on the human dynamics—the way grief isolates us, how families can be both sanctuary and prison—she's compelling.
But the book suffers from what I can only describe as a lack of restraint. It reminded me of someone who took a masterclass with Tana French and tried to imitate her atmospheric style without understanding that French's power comes from what she doesn't say. Where French would let dread build through implication and silence, McConaghy tends to spell things out. The climate change messaging, while important, occasionally tips into preachiness. I'm not a climate denier by any stretch, but the environmental themes felt heavy-handed where they could have been devastating.
This brings me to something that particularly frustrated me as a gay reader: the treatment of Raff's backstory. We learn that he had a relationship with a male scientist on the island that ended in tragedy, but it feels more like a red herring than meaningful character development. The relationship gets surface-level treatment—enough to establish that Raff is queer and grieving, but not enough to give it real emotional weight or purpose in the story. For a book that's otherwise so concerned with exploring different kinds of love and loss, this felt like a missed opportunity. I wanted more depth, more specificity about what that relationship meant to Raff and how it shaped him. Instead, it reads like backstory rather than something that adds genuine nuance to his character or moves the plot forward.
Maybe my expectations were too high going in. The critical praise was so universal that I was expecting something transcendent, and what I got was very good but not quite great. McConaghy is clearly a talented writer—her sense of place is remarkable, her prose is beautiful, and she handles the thriller elements well. But the book doesn't trust its own subtlety. Where it could have been haunting, it's often simply loud.
That said, I'd still recommend Wild Dark Shore to readers who love atmospheric literary thrillers, especially those interested in climate fiction that's more about human adaptation than dystopian despair. Just go in knowing it's a book that wears its heart—and its environmental message—firmly on its sleeve. It's gorgeous and immersive, with real emotional moments and a unique setting. I just wouldn't put it on my list of books that changed my life.
