Beth is married to Frank. Together, they manage a farm with Franks brother Jimmy. The story is told in chapters of before and the present. It is beautifully written and I love how the author slowly unfolds the tale of Beth’s past love and her husband

Book of the motherfucking year. My eyes are wet! If you see any reviews below five stars, they're fuckin' lying. There were moments when I gripped the book with tension, shook my head at a certain character's antics, and exclaimed out loud. Broken Country is more than just a love triangle. It's grief, guilt, loss... I felt it all. Read in two days and I would do it again. WOW.

Thank you to the publisher and NetGalley — hilariously, I didn’t remember I received this arc and waited like 26 weeks to read it through my library after it published 🫠

Anyway, beautifully written but the end was a bit too far-fetched for my liking. I also realllllly struggle with books about affairs. Just not my bag.

If you’re a reader like me who goes in on Kristin Hannah’s The Great Alone or Delia Owens’ Where the Crawdads Sing, Broken Country might be your perfect next read. Set in a small town in England, a farmer’s wife deals with the grief of losing her son, the fear her marriage will fail, and the yearning for the first man she ever loved (who’s recently turned up back in town with his own son). At the same time, the reader is placed in the picturesque village where they live, a setting in which it’s impossible not to get caught up.

Written in two timelines, the narrative follows Beth as the story of her first love unfolds in the past and as she deals with the trial of a dead man in the present. Hall’s writing of Beth and Gabriel’s love story was breathtaking, and I found myself grinning and kicking my feet feeling like a teenager myself on more than one occasion. That story is juxtaposed with the story of Beth’s marriage (to another man) and their shared grief over the death of their son Bobby.

When Gabriel shows up back in town with his own son Leo in tow (who’s not much younger than Bobby would have been), Beth’s in a tangle of emotions: it’s clear she and Gabriel still have feelings for each other, and Leo, who’s desperate for a friend, comes to rely on Beth, but she feels guilty as well for using him to fill the hole left by Bobby.

Hall writes Beth so well, and I found myself at times having to put the book down because I was feeling anxious and guilty on Beth’s behalf. In addition to characterization, Hall also paints a beautiful, vivid portrait of their little English village: namely the farm where Beth and her husband live (and the animals, birdcalls, species of trees, etc. that inhabit it) and the manor nearby where Gabriel lives (the lake where Gabriel and Beth met as kids is a personal favorite).

I didn’t give this one five stars because I wanted more — more background, more information, more perspectives from other characters. Which is maybe the best reason not to give a book five stars? I felt with more info I would have connected to the other characters the same way I did to Beth.

But overall, I highly recommend this one, especially to readers who appreciate nature as a character. By turns beautiful and absolutely heart-wrenching, this is one to savor.

I adored this book!! I could not put it down! I loved it so much, it’s my first and only five star read so far in 2025. Soo sooo good. I adored the characters, the story, all of it! I call this a must read!

This book is absolutely amazing. Thank you Netgalley and publishers for allowing me the chance to read it. Top 5 of the year.

Broken Country is a truly beautiful book, and though I just finished listening to it as an audiobook, my thoughts continue to swirl around the book's themes of first love, second chances, the loss of innocence and idealism, the complexities of the human heart and the injury that secrets and lies can leave in their wake. In many ways, it reminds of David Guterson's novel, Snow Falling on Cedars, which is still one of my favorite books of all time.

It is beautifully written and expertly executed, and I haven't read a book this good in a very long time. It was worth stepping away from my happily ever afters for a short time, but it definitely made my heart hurt. I am glad that the ending is hopeful and centers around the healing that has occurred in the wake of all the tumult. I can honestly say that I anticipate having a remarkably intense book headache after having listened to this amazing story. Hattie Morahan does a wonderful job narrating this book.

I received an Advanced Reader Copy from NetGalley, and I am leaving my review voluntarily.

SO GOOD! This was heartbreaking - in every which way - but I absolutely loved it. The writing is beautiful, the characters are real (I obviously don't love what Beth did but man do I understand it). Highly recommend but be warned you will cry!

Couldn't put this down once I started. The storytelling of this book was phenomenal. This book broke my heart in the best way!

Four Stars Broken Country is a beautifully written and emotionally layered novel that held me from the first page. The tension is masterfully sustained, and the central mystery—woven through grief, memory, and long-buried secrets—kept pulling me back in, even when I had to step away.

While I occasionally found the multiple timelines a bit disorienting, causing me to momentarily lose my footing in the narrative, the strength of the characters and the emotional weight of the story always brought me back.

Beautiful writing and a page-turning plot. I can absolutely see why this was such a huge hit this spring and I'm sure the film/TV adaptation is forthcoming. It felt a bit dramatic and like everything that could be thrown at the plot was, but I still really enjoyed it. Tied up nicely with a bow, perhaps too nicely for some of the actions taken by the characters.

Thank you to NetGalley and Simon & Schuster for the advanced reader copy of this novel--all opinions are my own.

Gosh, what a heart wrencher of a story this was!! Set in the English countryside in the late 1960s..the protagonist is a woman, loved by two men, grieving the tragic loss of her child. Not sure I've ever read a book that examines love in all its different facets with brilliance such as this one.

As much as I don't love a dual timeline, it absolutely was the best way to tell this story. I was kept in suspense until the end on a few aspects of the plot--well done storytelling!! Highly recommend.

Broken Country was impossible to put down---I read it in less than a day. Clare Leslie Hall does an amazing job of telling the story of Beth and a love triangle that is full of secrets. Beth's former love, Gabriel, has returned to his family home after over a decade, bringing his young son with him and stirring up former emotions and complicated new ones within Beth. Beth, who is now married to Frank, is trying to deal with the death of her son Bobby while processing the traumatic way that he perished.

Overall, Hall manages to go back in forth, telling the story of Beth's youth and her modern day dilemas, slowing revealing to readers how they are connected. This novel was fantastic and will stay with me for quite some time.

Five stars for this beautifully written book! At the beginning, we learn a farmer’s been killed and someone’s on trial. The story moves back and forth between when Beth met and left her first love Gabriel and the present, when as a married woman, she reconnects with Gabriel. In the intervening years, Beth has known the love of her gentle husband Frank and her son who she loses in a tragic accident. The book is part thriller and part romance as secrets are revealed and the aftermath dealt with. I loved how the story played out and the ending was well-crafted. A very satisfying read. Will want to read this author again.

Clare Leslie Hall really knocked the ball out of the park on this one. From the first page that grips you and won't let you go until the end. Filled with mystery, intrigue, restlessness, secrets, heartbreak after heartbreak, and a winding tale that you just keep following until you get answers. It's a fantastic read that I just devoured. Definitely dive in!
*I received a copy of this book from NetGalley. This review is my own opinion*

This was such a fantastic book; a beautiful and haunting telling of a love triangle between a woman and the two men that she loves in different ways, and the consequences of loving these men. I loved how the author introduces the mystery without knowing right away who the victim or the accused are. We really get insight into Beth and Gabriel's relationship over the years. Beth and Frank's relationship is quite so developed but we are still able to get a sense of who Frank is.

I found this book simply riveting and I will be searching books in Ms. Hall's backlist. I can't wait to read what she writes next! Thanks. to NetGalley and Simon & Schuster for this copy.

What a wonderful, well-written book! I enjoyed this so much!

The storytelling, tone, and emotion in this book are superb. I couldn't put it down.

Beth is a woman with a past, once happily married but never the same since the loss of her young son to a tragic accident. When her first love returns to their village a chance meeting changes her life, her marriage and her entire future.

<b>In Hall's <i>Broken Country,</i> characters do their duties, find wondrous love, feel heartbreak, suffer tragedies, sometimes act impulsively, and reel from the consequences of all of the above. A mystery surrounds a deadly moment, and the book ends with a hopeful, imperfect, heartbreaking way forward.</b>

Beth and her kind husband Frank live and farm outside the small English village where they grew up. They love each other, but they are able to stay married only because they push down the memories of tragedies that could haunt them, and because secrets from the past stay buried.

But when Frank's brother shoots a dog going after the family's sheep, the gunshot sets into motion events that will change everything.

The dog belonged to Gabriel Wolfe, Beth's childhood love, and his return to town brings back long-suppressed complications around jealousies, love, choices, and the weighty consequences of the past.

I love a farm-life novel, and in <i>Broken Country,</i> Hall creates a background of relentless care, feeding, planting, harvesting, repair, routines, life, and death. Against the straightforward, duty-driven work, Hall sets a complex, twisted set of past affections, heartbreak, vulnerability, and hurt, then offers up faulted, broken, hopeful, impulsive characters who are at times wondrously stoic, and at other times act against their best interests, complicating everything and potentially destroying everything in their wake.

<i>Broken Country</i> is a study of an extreme, life-and-death-stakes fallout after heartbreaking tragedy, but it's also a story of young love blossoming, then shriveling under the first pressures of the outside world; it's a mystery in which duty overpowers the difficult truth; and it's a hopeful view of how an imperfect set of characters can find their clumsy, sometimes beautiful, way forward.

I read this immersive story in a flash.

I received a prepublication edition of <i>Broken Country</i> courtesy of Simon & Schuster and NetGalley.

This was one of my favorite books of the month when I read it AND it was one of my <a href="https://www.bossybookworm.com/post/ten-bossy-spring-favorites"><b>Ten Bossy Spring Favorites.</a></b> Check out the others on that list!

<b>To see my full review on Bossy Bookworm, or to find out about Bossy reviews and Greedy Reading Lists as soon as they're posted, please see <a href="https://www.bossybookworm.com/post/review-of-broken-country-by-clare-leslie-hall/"><i>Broken Country.</a></i></b>

A beautiful story with a mystery. Beths brother in law shoots a dog that is chasing their sheep. This dog belonged to Beths old flame Gabriel. Lots of secrets, a tragic situation, and jealousies. Great love story to read.