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The lush beauty of North Dorset comes to life in “Broken Country,” a brilliant, creatively structured novel by Claire Leslie Hall certain to be embraced by readers. The story moves back and forward in time detailing the repercussions that occur when a past love affair collides with a new one.
Beth is at the center of the love triangle. It’s 1968, and she’s talking with her husband Frank, a goodhearted, gentle man, who tends his sheep and works his land with Jimmy, his younger brother. In Beth and Frank’s interchange, suspicions arise, the tension between them building as they discuss their neighbor Gabriel, a successful writer who has moved back into his great house, Meadowlands, after a prolonged absence. Gabriel, recently separated from his wife, settles in Dorset with his 10-year-old son.
Seeds of doubt planted, the story shifts to 1955, when teenage Beth is walking in the countryside. There she encounters Gabriel, whom she’s never met. He roundly chastises her for being on Meadowland’s private property. His attitude rankles Beth, a village girl raised by working class school teachers.
Beth is a poet and a romantic, her head often in the clouds. Initially she’s unimpressed with Gabriel, who is monied and seems haughty, but it isn’t long before they realize they have much in common—both are “would-be writers…dreamers, two lonely teenagers waiting for their lives to begin.” Soon they are immersed in a love affair, one interrupted when Gabriel leaves to attend Oxford. At university, he grows attracted to Louisa. A budding romance develops between them that breaks Beth’s heart when she learns about it on a visit to Oxford for her entrance interview.
Overnight, Beth’s world collapses. Her future in shreds, she returns to Dorset, and to Frank, who has always cared for her deeply. Realizing she “…might have thrown away the chance of something great,” Beth agrees to marry Frank. She becomes a farmer’s wife, her “…days filled with bitterly cold mornings, the magic of a lamb being born at sunrise.”
Their lives are rich and fulfilling, Beth giving birth to a son, Bobby, who becomes the light of his parents’ lives until an accident causes Beth and Frank to pull away from each other with tragic results that affect the entire family. Overnight Frank’s brother, who adored Bobby, begins drinking to excess, causing problems in his marriage and around the village where his violent antics become the talk of the town, Frank often called upon to get his brother out of trouble.
As the narrative shifts between time periods, mention of a trial is made leaving readers in suspense as to who is suspect in the murder of a farmer—impending doom building as the pages turn. Once secrets are revealed, readers will want to return to the beginning of “Broken Country” for a reread, and the opportunity to see the characters in a new light and finally understand the reasons behind their complicated maneuvers to mast the truth. This is a masterful story not to be missed.
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