Broken Country (Reese’s BK Club) by Clare Leslie Hall

A Reese’s Book Club Pick | A New York Times Bestseller

Some secrets are meant to stay buried. Others have a way of clawing back to the surface.

Broken Country is the kind of novel that settles into your bones—a sweeping tale of first love, impossible choices, and the dangerous pull of the past. Clare Leslie Hall has crafted something remarkable here: a story that reads like literary fiction but moves with the propulsive force of a thriller.

Beth’s life seems settled. She has a good marriage to Frank, a gentle man who loves her. But when her brother-in-law shoots a dog threatening their sheep, everything begins to unravel. The dog belongs to Gabriel Wolfe—the man who broke Beth’s heart years ago, the one she’s never quite forgotten. Gabriel has returned to their small village with his young son Leo, and suddenly Beth is caught between the woman she once was and the woman she’s become.

What follows is a masterfully layered mystery that toggles between past and present, revealing how old jealousies and buried secrets can erupt with deadly consequences. Reese Witherspoon praised the novel’s stunning twist: “Seriously, that ending?! I did not see it coming.”

Perfect for readers who loved Where the Crawdads Sing and The Paper Palace, this is a story about the choices that shape us, the loves we can’t forget, and the price we pay for keeping secrets. Hall writes with the kind of emotional precision that makes every page feel essential—and every revelation land like a thunderclap.

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