WILD DARK SHORE by Charlotte McConaghy

Dominic Salt and his three children—Raff, Fen, and Orly—are caretakers of the remote island of Shearwater near Antarctica and are tasked with preserving the United Nations’ seed vault.  These seeds are intended to enable humans to survive when all else is destroyed by climate change.  Shearwater was at one time a research station, but now the Salts are there alone until a boat comes to remove them and the seeds from Shearwater in 6 weeks.  And what an eventful six weeks they will be, beginning with Fen’s rescue of a woman named Rowan who is barely alive, while the captain of Rowan’s boat did not survive their shipwreck.  As Rowan is being nursed back to health, we discover that her husband, Hank, was the head of the research station, but we don’t really know what happened to him.  Clues emerge one by one, but the Salt family has secrets galore, including the big one regarding Hank’s whereabouts.  This novel fits into multiple genres, as it is a mystery, a survival story, a love story, and perhaps even a ghost story, all rolled into one.  I found the briskly paced plot to be gripping, as this family is beset by one disaster after another, but the book tugged at my heartstrings as well.  A scene with beached whales moved me almost to tears.  The characters are few, and each one is grieving a tragic loss or shouldering almost unbearable guilt.