Marrow Island

Book excerpt: The award-winning novel that’s “a foreboding, compelling story of humanity’s uneasy relationship with nature and with each other . . . a gripping read” (St.Louis Post-Dispatch). It has been twenty years since Lucie Bowen left the islands—when the May Day Quake shattered thousands of lives; when Lucie’s father disappeared in an explosion at the Marrow Island oil refinery, a tragedy that destroyed the island’s ecosystem; and when Lucie and her best friend, Katie, were just Puget Sound children hoping to survive. Now, Katie writes with strange and miraculous news. Marrow Island is no longer uninhabitable and no longer abandoned. She is part of a community that has managed to conjure life again from Marrow’s soil. Lucie returns. Her journalist instincts tell her there’s more to this mysterious “Colony” and their charismatic leader—a former nun with an all-consuming plan—than its members want her to know. As she uncovers their secrets, will Lucie endanger more than their mission? And what price will she pay for the truth? “Eerie and intriguing . . . captivates in the first few pages and delivers a gripping, compelling story throughout.”—Milwaukee Journal Sentinel “Smith’s excellent command of language gives life to arresting characters and their creepy surroundings, keeping the suspense in this dark environmental thriller running high.”—Elle “This alluring novel explores the darkness of love, how it can cajole you into danger or tip your actions toward cruelty. Clean but intoxicating writing . . . Ambitious.”—The New York Times Book Review “Transporting.”—Vanity Fair “Beautifully wrought.”—O, The Oprah Magazine “Engrossing and atmospheric, a thorny meditation on environmental responsibility with a big haunted heart.”—Miami Herald