Even during the peak of wolf mania a few years ago, I was never really into wolves—or most animals, really, until I looked a cat in the eye. Anyway, this novel focuses heavily on a fictional project of rewilding the Scottish Highlands and reintroducing wolves in order to cull the locally abundant deer population and promote the growth of trees so that the country may be forested once more. Before reading this book, I had little idea of rewilding or conservation aside from the basics, but the premise intrigued me (not to mention the well-designed cover), so when I saw it on BOTM this month, I went for it. Fastest turn around time for a BOTM pick for me—didn’t sit on my shelf too long at all!

This was a weirdly paced book. The beginning opens up with an interesting scene from the twins’ childhood, and the narrative goes back and forth between timelines to gradually dip the reader into the characters’ backstories, traumas, and provide explanations for the current stage of the story. But I found this less engaging and more distracting. I was really immersed in the parts describing the forests, the wild, the wolves—the part that focused on rewilding and taught me quite a bit on what goes into this type of work and more about ecology generally.

The novel naturally focuses on Inti Flynn, the main character, but her relationships to the other characters felt flat and uninspired to me—even her twin sister, Aggie, who supposedly has a deep trauma that impacts Inti tremendously, only makes a brief appearance in the first half of the book. The book does a lot to tell us that Inti cares about her sister, but little to show how or the specific things she does. In fact, a lot of the book is talking to the reader about rewilding, which I appreciated, but it left much to be desired in the way of plot. (There was also a big deal made of her having mirror-touch synesthesia, which is something that sounds cool in the blurb, but in reality it seemed to make little difference to the plot.)

This book also tried to be a murder mystery but there wasn’t much mystery to it honestly, and I’m not a seasoned mystery or thriller reader either. I could see the ‘twist’ coming from quite early on, and when it happened, it felt resolved—but dull. The romance was also extremely unnecessary, but I’m not a fan of that in general so others may have a completely different read of that. Another reviewer also described this book as ‘trauma porn’ and while this didn’t pop immediately in mind while reading like it did for another book I read recently, I can see why that might apply here. I also glanced at a review for the author’s previous romance novel and apparently she has some questionable views, at least through the characters’ mouthpieces, on domestic violence and the relationship between abuser and victim. It didn’t sit well with me.

While this ended up being more of a slow burn read, I did enjoy the exposure to the specific environment that McConaghy presents in this book, as well as the emphasis on the nature of the relationship between human beings and nature, as well as rewilding specifically. The novel also touches on themes of abuse, domestic violence, and the lingering effects of deep-seated traumas, so this isn’t a pleasant walk in the park type of read. Despite these faults, the book inspires a lot of reflection and curiosity in the reader, whether that is looking up more on rewilding, or the nature of forestry in Europe, or what have you. I took my time reading this but I have to admit, I really liked certain parts of it—even while others were lacking.