Wild Dark Shore

Content Warning: This section of the guide includes discussion of death, child death, animal death, graphic violence, physical abuse, sexual harassment, and cursing.

Each of the characters in Wild Dark Shore represents a different aspect of the core theme of ethical action in the face of climate change. Collectively, they articulate both positive and negative reactions to the existential threat that anthropogenic climate change poses to humanity, wildlife, and ecosystems more generally.

Rowan is emblematic of a transformation from nihilistic despair in the face of climate-change-driven destruction to a more positive, proactive approach. When Rowan first arrives on Shearwater Island, her views about what can be done about climate change are bleak. She shares her husband Hank’s view that “this world is a dumpster fire” (245), saying, “[W]e’re all fucked. We’re dead. […] All life: drowned, burned, or starved” (256). However, she learns from the proactive stances of the Salt family and reframes her feelings about how to respond. Dominic, though “shaken” by the effects of climate change, encourages her not to give up with simple, straightforward advice. He repairs things “that are gonna break again soon. […] Because someone has to, or everything just stays broken” (122). He later explains, “[M]aybe we will drown or burn or starve one day, but until then we get to choose if we’ll add to that destruction or if we will care for each other” (256). Echoing Rowan’s own words, he suggests that what matters is not the ultimate outcome of climate change but rather how one responds in the moment. 

Similarly, Rowan learns from Fen that intervention in the face of suffering is necessary. Fen dedicates herself to the seals, helping them give birth and attempting to stop the adults from “squashing” the pups. From Orly, she learns that sometimes it is necessary to value wild plants and animals over the survival of humanity. Rowan’s transformation is catalyzed when she dedicates herself to helping the Salt family save as many seeds as possible from the vault before the walls give way. She resolves, “[W]e will just…keep going” to save what they can (226).

Hank’s turn to destructive despair over climate change is a reverse image of Rowan’s proactive turn. Hank is tasked with determining which seeds will survive and which will be left to die. The “burden” of this effort breaks something inside of him. Rowan understands his sadness: “contemplating the scale of these seeds—and there are so many of them—I can feel the weight Hank must have been under […] how to let biodiversity die in favor of what humans can eat” (119). As a result of this impossible task, Hank starts “throwing packets of seeds into the ocean” (250). Instead of making a choice to be more proactive, he makes the unethical decision to destroy everything, as it is, in his view, already “dead.”

Although the novel clearly frames Hank’s actions as wrong and Rowan’s arc as redemptive, its depiction of the Salts underscores that there is ambiguity in the discussion surrounding climate change. The family struggles with how best to make ethical decisions, and it is not always clear whether their choices are “correct.” For instance, they make the controversial and difficult choice to save beached humpback whales rather than focus on saving seeds from the vault. However, ultimately, they always choose to affirm life rather than embrace death, which the novel suggests must be the starting point when responding to climate change.