I’m not sure what I can say about this book. It wrecks your heart from the very beginning and keeps you guessing through the whole thing. I sat and read this from start to finish in one sitting. It keeps you engaged and on an emotional rollercoaster. This is one of the easiest 5 star reads I’ve read this year. Pick this one up.

Thank you Simon and Schuster and Netgalley for the complimentary digital copy of Broken Country! Sadly y’all, I don’t think this one is worthy of the hype. A solid drama with elements of family clashes, a love triangle, some courtroom drama, a lovely English countryside setting, etc. I just didn’t buy into the love story that didn’t get much setup, and both of the twists I felt could be seen a mile away.
I wish the author had gotten to the ‘reveal’ much earlier in order dig into what comes AFTER. (Won’t say much more because of spoilers.) I am also not a fan of novels where the forward motion of the plot relies on the first person narrator withholding information. If you prefer more plot versus character study, then I think you might enjoy this book. I was entertained, and was curious to see how she would bring it all together, but overall felt it was melodramatic and soapy.

Clare Leslie Hall’s Broken Country is a hauntingly beautiful novel about love, grief, and the weight of the past. Set against the backdrop of a quiet rural town in Dorset, the story follows Beth and Frank, a couple who have managed to find a fragile sense of peace after the devastating loss of their son, Bobby. They find solace in each other and in the rhythms of farm life, alongside Frank’s brother, Jimmy. But that fragile peace is shattered when Gabriel, a former love of Beth’s and now a famous writer, returns with his own son, Leo—a boy who bears an uncanny resemblance to the child Beth lost.
As Gabriel’s presence reawakens long-buried emotions, Beth is drawn into a tangle of grief, longing, and regret. Her deep connection to Leo complicates everything, blurring the boundaries between memory and reality. Meanwhile, the relationships that have held her together begin to unravel, forcing her to confront painful truths about the past and the choices she has made.
Hall’s writing is exquisite, capturing both the rawness of grief and the aching beauty of human resilience. The novel is gripping and deeply emotional, weaving a story that is as heartbreaking as it is compelling. The atmosphere is heavy with longing, and the characters are richly drawn, each carrying their own burdens in ways that feel profoundly real.
Broken Country is a novel that lingers long after the final page, a meditation on love, loss, and the fragile ties that bind us to one another. Readers who appreciate deeply felt, beautifully written fiction will find themselves utterly captivated.

yeah believe the hype on this one - really well done and emotional story about how an affair impacts the lives of the 3 involved and ultimately leads to a murder. loved the small farming town setting and Hall’s writing exploring those complex dynamics.

I am going to preface this by saying.....don’t hate me.....(note: the second half of this review contains spoilers, there is a warning.)

Broken Country has been getting a TON of buzz lately in the #bookstagram and publishing/bookselling world. Rightfully so, because it is a captivating story with well crafted characters and an intriguing plot line filled with first love, grief, and scandal. I found it propulsive and hard to put down.

I liked the journey, but the ending was where I got stuck when I tried crafting my thoughts. I don’t want to give away any spoilers, so here is your warning. And I’m not saying I didn’t like it, I did, it just wasn’t five stars for me.

Here’s the thing, I’m all for a messy romance with a thriller-ish mix of a courtroom drama, but there was a disconnect for me. The ending felt too tidy for me. For as messy of a situation this was, coupled with the grief of losing a child, I truly think it was a stretch to end with Beth and Frank running off into their happily ever after with their child. The story felt realistic until the end, which requires you to suspend a lot of disbelief. I also wanted a bit more of the trial. That part felt rushed.

How should this book have ended? Idk, but Beth getting her ‘dream life’ and Frank going to jail for years over her lover and having to just get over his wife cheating on him seemed disappointing to me.

This story is intense, filled with secrets, heartbreak, and unexpected twists. It follows Beth, her husband Frank, and her old love Gabriel as they deal with the tragic loss of a child.

There’s also a trial at the heart of the story, adding a layer of mystery. You’re constantly trying to figure out who’s on trial and what really went down. The dual timelines make it even more gripping, and the way the characters evolve keeps you hooked until the very end.

But more than anything, this book is about love—how it can endure across time and distance in ways you wouldn’t expect. My mind grappled with whether or not to be angry at Beth. And the ending? It hits hard. It’s emotional, bittersweet, and lingers in your mind long after you’ve finished.

(4.5 stars)
Broken Country has been getting rave reviews and now that I’ve read it, I can understand why. It’s hard to describe the genre - it’s a bit family drama, a bit mystery, a bit courtroom drama, and a bit romance. It’s very atmospheric, taking place in a small village in Dorset, England, in both the 1950s and the 1960s.

Right off the bat, you know someone is dead, but you don’t know who for quite a while. We gradually get to know everything. Beth is the main character telling the story. We meet her as a teenager, one who desperately wants to be a writer and attend Oxford University, which has started admitting female students to some of its colleges. She meets the local rich boy, Gabriel, home from boarding school for the summer, after wandering onto his property by accident, and they fall in love quickly. The time frame switches to 1968 and Beth is married to Frank, a local farmer she’d known since they were in school together. We find out that their young son is dead but again, we don’t know why or how. And now Gabriel has come back to the village with his own young son. The book bounces back and forth between the two timelines.

For me, this was a sad story but one that kept me turning the pages. This is one book that lived up to my high expectations.

Thank you to Simon & Schuster and NetGalley for the opportunity to read an advance readers copy of this book. All opinions are my own.

I think this book has already broken me into a million pieces—in the best possible way! It carries a melodramatic tone but is heartbreakingly powerful, deeply penetrating your emotions. At first glance, you might think it’s a typical, clichéd love triangle: a grieving woman, still mourning the loss of her son and trying to hold on to her marriage with her kind-hearted husband, suddenly finds her ex—the love of her life—returning to town. He’s freshly divorced and has a son the same age her son was when he died. Cue the whistles and the inevitable “here comes trouble” reaction!
There’s still a spark between the former lovers, and as they rekindle their connection, someone is bound to get hurt. Every action comes with consequences. Despite its simplicity, this book manages to be so much more than just an unfinished love story. Blended with elements of crime, mystery, and courtroom drama, it’s a gripping, unputdownable read. I couldn’t stop thinking about it!

Set in the 1950s/60s, Beth and her husband Frank are living a quiet life in the English countryside until her brother-in-law shoots a dog on their sheep farm. The owner of the dog turns out the be the only other man Beth has ever loved, Gabriel. The book sets up that there is a trial but the reader is unsure who has been killed and who is on trial until much further in the novel. While that is slowly revealed we learn, through flashbacks and present day scenes, of Beth's relationship with both Gabriel and Frank as well as their other historical entanglements and tragedies.

I'm not sure why I waited so long to read this one, I've had it forever (although I'm glad I waited until @simonaudio gifted me the audiobook to accompany the book because the narrator was wonderful). I kept seeing the hype around this novel and I was concerned that it wouldn't live up to it, but I became almost instantly engrossed in this book that I texted my friend (who I was buddy reading this one with) that I was at 24% and then three hours later I had to text her that I was already done. This story has multidimensional characters, the pacing works and the story has unpredictable twists and turns as any good mystery should. The author was at my Barnes & Noble a few weeks ago but I missed it and now I am so disappointed! This will definitely be on my best of list and I will be recommending to everyone. I can see why this is a Reece pick.

4.5 stars

Thank you to S&S and NetGalley for the ARC to review

ARC provided in exchange for an honest review.

This book was fantastic! It was everything I didn’t know I needed at this moment! The ending! So many twist and turns it made my head spin. I loved all the complicated relationships between the main characters and their children. I would highly recommend if you love family drama and mysteries! This book will not disappoint you!

This book was so well written. Because I like how she Divided the Chapters on each character in the book. And how she Told the story in the past tense and then in the future. There is also a Trial in this book which ties all the characters together. BE t. H. Was a young girl in. RURAL.England. The shoulder how she really wanted to go to oxford. She fell in love with Ga. BRI ELWO LF. E! Frank Also l Look her too She had a summer Love affair. G APR i.e. L.. He was very W e a l t h. She also came from a poor background. I like how she started to develop herself but things turned really bad.When she went up to oxford to visit him and became pregnant. She Read his diary and Found out He was Seeing another woman. She left oxford and went back to her village and mary frank. They were very.
Happy and you were in each other but Tragedy struck when When bobby died. Marriage start to fall apart. The book really took off at this point. When Jimmy Killed chin b r I e l dog. That fell in love with him again.And things got really crazy especially when jimmy married Woman has he showed up at the wedding. Chimney had a drinking problem and it was very evident for me.He would get really upset. Everybody had stories to tell about this family. Because try to be seen to follow The tragedies of this family.. Things got really bad when they found out Beth was seeing him again. This is when the trial takes place. It.
Has very important part of ending In the story you love it.

Officially 4.5 stars. What an unputdownable read! Part family drama, part literary fiction, and part mystery, this book packs an emotional punch throughout its 320 pages. This one got off to a rough start for me at first, as it begins with the death of a dog (huge issue for me in books, and no, this is not a spoiler). For those wondering, the death is right at the beginning (page 13 in the Book of the Month edition) and it's definitely a page you can skip right over and keep going without missing anything. Though it's the catalyst for the story, it's not something that's drawn out, and it's rarely mentioned again in the book. The character development in this book is SO well done--some characters are more likable than others but they all felt very real.
The events in the last part of the book literally had me on the edge of my seat and gasping out loud. There's a reason this book is getting a lot of hype, and it's definitely a book I recommend!

Gosh this one was good. A story of first love and true love, a story with heartbreak and redemption. A trial for murder mixed in along the way. Full of heart and emotion, this one was awesome!

Clare Leslie Hall tells the age-old story of the privileged son of a landowner and a young girl of a different class who fall in love over an idyllic summer, only to be separated when the young man goes away to Oxford. As in all love stories of this sort, the summer’s love is not enduring.

Beth marries a farmer from the community who has always loved her and she is contented in her life as a farmer’s wife. Until tragedy strikes. As this couple try to reinvent their lives, the privileged son returns with his own son. His presence in the village effects everyone in the story.

Hall has written a beautifully nostalgic novel about love in all its forms, losses, and death. An underlying theme is the importance of communication in all our relationships. Her characters are so real that they seem to walk and breathe—and hurt. Anyone with a heart will be drawn into this story.

My thanks to NetGalley, Simon and Schuster and Clare Leslie Hall for an advanced copy of this book. My opinions are my own.

I have never read anything by this author before, and it is a genre I seldom read. So when I tell you I gave this love story a 4-star rating, that should tell you something. It all started back in the mid 50ties, when Gabriel and Beth discovered a love that would last decades, although things went very wrong not too far into it and they separated. Beth married a farmer, and was happy with him until a great tragedy occurred in the marriage. Three years later, she is surprised to see Gabriel has come back, divorced with a son. As you may guess, although it is now 1968, the attraction is as strong as ever and she has an affair. Another tragedy hits, there is a trial and you will have to read the book to see how it comes out. It is written in five parts, and kept me reading. I did see the twist in the book coming, but it did not matter. And I cried at the end.

Broken Country by Clare Leslie Hall is my favorite book of the year. I cannot think of another novel that has hit me like this one. I've recommended and purchased it for several friends and family since reading it.

Broken Country is a genre bender. It's part historical fiction, part mystery, part love triangle. It's character driven but with the suspense of a mystery. The characters are all fully developed and you feel for them. The story reminded me of Sweet Home Alabama in regards to the love triangle aspect: you love both men equally and could envision the main character with either of them.

The story starts out with an excellent quote worthy of binge reading: "The farmer is dead. He is dead, and all anyone wants to know is who killed him."

Beth is our main character and she is married to Frank. One day, a dog comes after one of their sheep on the farm and the event causes a domino effect on the character's lives. You see, the dog is owned by Beth's ex boyfriend's son. The ex boyfriend that broke her heart.

I do not want to give too much away, but this story has such depth to it. The story has resulted in me still thinking about the twists and turns that take place and the empathy the reader has towards the main characters and the decision they have made.

This is a page turner and full five stars from this reader.

This book is sure to be on a lot of 2025 favorites. A love story, a thriller, family drama... Broken Country has it all! This debut will have me looking for more books by Clare Leslie Hall.

Broken Country is a breathtaking, heartbreaking mystery, told through alternating timelines that I am so glad I read. I knew it would break my heart going in, but I failed to anticipate just how many ways it would hurt by the end, and I was truly surprised when it was all said and done. More than once, I was shocked at what happened - I simply didn't see it coming - and I love being surprised. It is well-written and full of flawed, perfectly human characters, full of life, love, anger, and every nuanced emotion in between. I think I'll come back to this one again, when I've had some time to recover.

Clare Leslie Hall's BROKEN COUNTRY intrigued me from the very moment I saw the beautiful cover and read the cover flaps. Then I started reading and my intrigue became delight with a well-told story with complicated and believeable characters doing their best and mucking through mistakes and misunderstandings, ultimately delivering deep satisfaction and a tired reader who stayed up way too late reading. I received a copy of this book and these opinions are my own, unbiased thoughts.

4.0. A good and engaging story until the end. However, I felt the ending was a bit too contrived and unrealistic.