A whale is beached on a small Welsh island in 1938 marking a change for the locals, particularly Manod, a young woman who sees the bleakness of island life and looking to the mainland for her future. Soon two English anthropologists arrive seeking her help to translate local stories and songs for them. Could this be her pathway from a dying community?


Whale Fall is a quick read but one packed full of beauty, simple joy, bursting with the power of nature. Atmospheric in a cold, wet, salty coastal existence that feels palpable to the reader. The sense of a lost time with traditions and beliefs being swept away with the tide brings urgency to this haunting story. Manod's internal conflict, wanting more in her life for her sister and herself, and this possible way out warms with personal crisis of opportunity slipping away. Whilst Manod works with the outsiders, her delightful sister and father crack on without Manod's hope. A truly beautiful, touching story.

I liked this but I didn‘t love it as much as I thought I would.

Even before I started it, I felt like the premise was very similar to Audrey Magee‘s The Colony. Although some of the writing was beautiful, the story fell far short of Magee‘s book. For me, there was little tension in comparison and there were a few points where there was a disconnect in the story - even the whale itself didn‘t quite draw everything together.

3.5 stars

Whale Fall is a stellar debut by Elizabeth O’Connor.

Set in 1938, 18-year-old Manod is the daughter of a fisherman on an isolated island off the coast of Wales. She lives with her father and her sister, who she takes care of now their mother has passed. The population of the island is dwindling following losses of the first World War and the younger generation seeking prosperity on the mainland. The another war hums in the background.

Two researchers come to the island to document the way of living. Manod’s proficiency in English means she becomes an assistant to them. She becomes enamoured with the pair and the possibilities they represent. O’Connor does a wonderful job of portraying the complexity of this dynamic.

Whale Fall is full of atmosphere and emotion with a very light touch. The conflict between tradition and modernity (or colonialism, depending on which character you ask) is written from an angle I haven’t seen much of - it felt both fresh and timely.

A gem. Thanks to NetGalley and the publishers for the eARC.

With thanks to the publishers and NetGalley for an advance review copy.

Set on a in 1938, this is an assured debut that deftly captures a world and a way of life that are about to change for ever.

18-year-old Manod is the daughter of a lobster fisherman on a rapidly depopulating remote island off the coast of Wales. The year is 1938; many of the few houses on the island are empty and falling into disrepair following the losses of the first World War and the younger generation who are increasingly seeking an easier life on the mainland. Manod's mother is dead so she looks after her younger sister and their father in their tiny cottage. The living is meagre and hard.

At the start of the novel, a whale is washed up on shore; in spite of attempts to float it into the sea, the carcass returns and remains on the beach, slowly decomposing. At around the same time, two young anthropologists arrive to carry out an ethnographic project to document the way of life on the island before it is too late, while in the background the rumblings of the impending war become harder to ignore, even in such a remote place.

Manod is relatively well educated, rare amongst the islanders in that she has been taught to speak English fluently by the visiting nuns who have charge of educating the ten or so children on the island. As such she is employed by the anthropologists to mediate and translate between them and the island inhabitants. At the outset she sees in them her hope of leaving for the mainland and a better life, but like the whale, they will turn out to be rotten at the core and she will need to make her own future happen.

This short novel ends with an author's note explaining that it was inspired by the stories of islands like St Kilda and the Arran islands which have suffered population decline over the course of the 20th century. Its sparse prose beautifully captures the dying throes of a way of life that is about to be swallowed up by progress and changed by historical events. Manod's character is beautifully portrayed - barely out of childhood, having led a sheltered, primitive life, a woman of few words, we make the same mistake as the anthropologists do if we think that she is therefore simple or ripe for exploitation. The emergence of her strength of character is flawlessly achieved, and flawlessly offset against the bigger picture of her little world, which she grows to see the value of even as she recognises how doomed it is. This is a gem of a book - read it.

The remote Welsh island setting of O’Connor’s debut novella was inspired by several real-life islands that were depopulated in the twentieth century due to a change in climate and ways of life: Bardsey, St Kilda, the Blasket Islands, and the Aran Islands. (A letter accompanying my review copy explained that the author’s grandmother was a Welsh speaker from North Wales and her Irish grandfather had relatives on the Blasket Islands.)

Eighteen-year-old Manod Llan is the older daughter of a lobster fisherman. Her sweetheart recently left to find work in a mainland factory. It’s 1938 and there are vague rumbles about war, but more pressing is the arrival of strangers here to study a vanishing culture. Anthropologists Edward and Joan learn snatches of Welsh and make recordings of local legends and songs, which are interspersed with the fragmentary narrative. Manod, star-struck, seeks the English researchers’ approval as she helps with translation and other secretarial duties, but becomes disillusioned with their misinterpretations and fascist leanings.

The gradual disintegration of a beached whale casts a metaphorical shadow of decay over the slow-burning story. I kept waiting for momentous events that never came. More definitive consequences? Something to do with Manod’s worries for her little sister, Llinos? A flash-forward to the abandoned island’s after-years? Or to Manod’s future? As it is, the sense of being stuck at a liminal time makes it all feel like prologue. But O’Connor’s writing is quite lovely (“The milk had formed a film over the surface and puckered, like a strange kiss”; “All of my decisions felt like trying to catch a fish that did not exist until I caught it”) and the book is strong on atmosphere and tension. I’ll look out for her next work.

LOVED LOVED LOVED, A lot of other reviews will be giving you the low down on this one, so all I’m gonna say is, stop waiting and just pick up a copy for yourself! A HIT I TELL YOU!
-
Thank you to the publisher for sending me an invite to read this one early!!

Set on a rural island off of mainland Wales in 1938 the story follows Manod, the daughter of a fisherman and a dead mother. The book opens with a dead whale that has washed up on the beach and the arrival of 2 researchers who come to explore the Island and it's inhabitants, Manod begins working with them and the relationship changes from a working one to one of exploitation.

It's quite a somber read and I felt sorry for Manod pretty much all the way through. It was interesting to read about the life of basically a fishing village and how lives become intertwined when there are so few people on the island you live on.

I loved the way it was written, sort of poetic in a choppy way, it felt really modern and I really enjoyed the writing so will definitely be looking at reading more of Elizabeth's work.

I would recommend to those that like quite slow paced historical fiction .

I’ve just read All Among The Barley by Melissa Harrison and it was a very interesting companion read to Whale Fall by Elizabeth O’Connor. Both books feature a young woman living in an isolated rural community in the 1930’s, unsure how to commence adult life now they’ve left school. In both books, an intriguing person (or two) arrives seeking help from our heroine to collect local folklore in exchange for some fascist propaganda. A weird coincidence in plot!

Nevertheless, I enjoyed Whale Fall and recommend it for lovers of historical rural fiction.

A remote island and a declining way of life set the backdrop for this story . Two anthropologists arrive to study the place and see how the feeling of loss pans out

Sublime. Elizabeth O’Connor is a supremely talented new writer and this book is just gorgeous. I loved the humanity that O’Connor brought to the characters, the big ideas contained within a simple premise. The image of Manod, living a hard and dirty life, but dressed in vintage velvet and silk dresses, was gloriously offbeat. O’Connor is a worthy successor to writers like Anne Enright and Colm Toibin with a clarity and simplicity that belies the depth of her story.
A simple story, told through the eyes of 18 year old Manod, of a pair of anthropologists researching a book about disappearing communities, Whale Fall includes tantalising snippets of their research: songs, folklore, histories of the inhabitants. There are wonderful descriptions of the wild natural world that the islanders both love and battle against. This reminded me of The Colony by Audrey Magee and The Outrun by Amy Liptrot The situation on the island echoes wider colonialism: the patronising idea of the noble savage, the romanticisation of a simple life close to nature, the irony of the anthropologists who speak only one language feeling superior to islanders fluent in English and Welsh.

Whale Fall by Elizabeth O’Connor is a rich, poetic novel of an imagined island lost to history. In 1938, Manod, a young woman lives on a remote island off the coast of Wales. The world is changing, a way of life vanishing as Manod looks to her future on the horizon when a beached whale arrives on the islands shores. Is it a sign or symbol of loss, misdirection or something else? The island is emptying, houses stand unoccupied, reminders of the men lost in the Great War and making a living on the island is becoming harder with each passing season. Two anthropologists arrive on the island to document this fading way of life and in them Manod sees a way to tap into a different world and perspective. But, as she guides them across the island revealing its history and secrets she becomes entangled in their lives in surprising ways and learns that her imagined future may be further out of reach than ever. This a sublime debut about loss and healing, trust and betrayal, life and death and a family surviving on the fringes of the world. I was very moved by the character of Manod, her desires, her hopes, how to move away and leave behind a family who need and rely on her, the weight and of that responsibility. The writing is poetic and melodic, interwoven with recordings of myths and legend of an island that although created by the author felt very real and three dimensional. It is a fast paced read, that is enchanting and vibrant for fans of historical fiction 4.25 ✨.

Whale Fall is a book I enjoyed and, like with many books I simply enjoy, I struggle to put into words just why. So this will probably just be a quick review!

The story follows Manod, who lives on a small, remote Welsh island. Two things happen at the start of the tale: one, the beaching of a whale, and two, the arrival of two English ethnographers who have come to document the island’s culture. It’s not hard to see where the plot might go from here.

O’Connor is very good at bringing this pre-WWII Welsh island to life, along with its inhabitants. It feels itself a little like, not an ethnography as the English visitors are writing, but a kind of peering into the lives of these characters. It’s only a snapshot, precipitated by the arrival of the whale/visitors (and we leave pretty much as they leave), but one that will stay with you.

Really the only reason I didn’t rate this higher than I did (3.5 stars, actually) was simply down to the fact that, while I enjoyed it, that’s all I felt reading it. It’s a very good book and many other readers will, I’m sure, love it more than me. For that reason, I would definitely recommend it.

Loved this book!

One of those books I literally could not put down. I loved the subtle ambiguity of the language and community.

A whale washed up on the beach provided the focus for two impressive debut novels I’ve read from the last couple of years, “The Whalebone Theatre” by Joanna Quinn and “The Whale Tattoo” by Jon Ransom (both 2022). I feel such an event works well in fiction as it evokes such a sense of the out of the ordinary for the community, a sobering experience of just what the sea contains. There’s the sadness and futility of the huge creature left to rot, excitement for children who witness this process and it often serves as an omen that things are about to change.
Another debut and another whale appearing on the beach of a sparsely populated island off the Welsh coast in 1938. In its wake come two English researchers, a man and a woman working on a book about life on the island. They employ 18 year old resident Manon as a translator, as a number there, including Manon’s younger sister, speak only Welsh. There’s a sense from the mainland that things are building towards war but it is everyday survival which the islanders focus on.
This is a quiet, short novel of 178 pages which is well written and maintains the interest. There’s a timelessness to it and the fictional location is inspired by a number of islands off the British/Irish coasts where populations and local traditions dwindled. It impresses with its strongly created main character and the pull of the island for her. Not that much happens but it is rich in atmosphere. The Observer highlighted it as one of the most anticipated debuts for 2024 which has already been a strong year for first fiction. I wonder if something so quietly assured and calm, and not to be taken as a criticism, slight, will stand out amongst much showier debuts.
Whale Fall will be published by Picador on 25th April. Many thanks to the publishers and Netgalley for the advance review copy.

Thank you to the publishers and NetGalley for this ARC.
3.5*

This was a beautiful read with complex themes which were incredibly well done. It transpired to not be my usual type of book (in that it wasn't very plot-driven), but that doesn't matter, as I still found myself enjoying it. At times, this read more like a poetry anthology than not! - in the best way possible; O'Connor's writing is so lyrical.

O'Connor is a great writer who is very talented, and I can't wait to see what she does next.

Whale Fall, a short, lyrical, feminist debut novel set on an imagined island off the coast of Wales in 1938, came tantalisingly close to being great for me. I just needed a little more from the story.

The eerie, remote setting had echoes of Metronome (Tom Watson), and the intrusion and exploitation by outsiders into island life was redolent of The Colony (Audrey Magee). It was named by the Observer on its list of Best Debut Novels for 2024.

Manod is a young woman contemplating her future on an isolated Welsh island, tied to her family and their impoverished existence but with a longing for a life elsewhere. When a whale beaches itself and there are rumours of submarines offshore, it's a portent for the islanders who are still recovering from the loss of so many of of their native menfolk in the Great War. Two English ethnographers arrive on the island around this time and Manod assists them as they document and catalogue island life, but are their intentions noble?

This had the makings of a great story but it petered out a little towards the end, It's one to read if you love lyrical writing, ominous settings and the plot/resolution doesn't matter too much to you. 3/5 stars

Many thanks to the author, publisher Pan Macmillan for the arc via Netgalley in exchange for an honest review. Whale Fall will be published on 25 April 2024.

My thanks go to NetGalley and Picador for a review copy of this book in exchange for my honest feedback.

Whale Fall follows Manod, a young woman living in the harsh landscape of an island situated off the coast of Wales. The time is 1938, and the rumblings of a war preparing to engage in conflict can be felt out at sea. A whale appears on the beach of Manod and her family’s sparse home. Questionable and mysterious at first, this is only compounded by the arrival of two English anthropologists, who speak of their interest in discovering everything there is to know about these scattered Welsh isles.

The blanket of this story is wonderfully touching in its coming of age tones. Manod can be naive at times - dreamy in her wants and goals for her future - but never delusional and always sincere. You want her to venture beyond the island, whilst wanting to protect her from those attempting to take advantage of that. Gradually, she begins to get tangled up in the relationship between the two anthropologists, and this naivety is what she must battle with in her crucial moments. She can be frustrating to sit with, but the reader is never pushed into a feeling of overriding annoyance. She is sheltered in certain aspects of her life - something that naturally comes with the territory of growing up on a secluded island with little contact beyond immediate family and the same 4 or 5 village neighbours - and her age plays a large role in her actions and decision making.

Age cannot be said to be a factor in how Manod’s younger sister operates within this tale. The younger sister is stubborn and untrusting towards the new-coming anthropologists, and with good reason. She sticks to the Welsh language, and never has nor never will she bend to the whims and fancies of the English for their molly-coddled comfort. I only wish that we spent more time with the younger sister, but I suppose the roughness of not knowing her too well comes with the satisfaction of watching her keep her guard up to any and all intruders.

The atmosphere of the novel sits well in its environment. Parts feel cold, blisteringly windy, wet and sodden, and I found O’Connor’s descriptions of island life working to create a dimension of character to the island itself. Not doing this, and making the island feel flat and one dimensional, would strip the novel back so much that slight dips in pacing would’ve killed the whole story. Thankfully, O’Connor treated the island with a care that shows her skill in novel-writing.

Whale Fall really snuck up on me. I did not expect it to hold my attention throughout, which is bad of me to say. I was expecting something lighter and less punchy. This is punchy but not in that instant-knockout-way. More so it brings to life Manod’s character from the first or second page, and that instantly feels like your gut has been grabbed. The book then proceeds to never let the gut go. It screws and turns the reader until the last page.
A note of appreciation to see the Welsh language still being inked forever to the page. Hold hope that it never dies.

Pick up Whale Fall. You will care by the end.

Whale Fall was requested on a whim but unfortunately I didn't like it! It was well-written and definitely a good book, but the story mostly never grabbed me and just wasn't really to my taste. There were a few interesting moments, but on the whole this book was just not the kind of book I like.

Such a beautiful debut. The descriptions of the island and the daily life of the inhabitants is rendered so clearly and bewitchingly! A short story that packs a punch and tells the difficult coming of age story of Manod and her journey to discover what she wants and how she's going to get it. Also such an interesting setting to explore the time period of early WWII. We will be getting this into the shop soon and I can't wait to start recommending it!

I feel that this novel seeped into my heart, led there by the main character Mabon.

The author writes beautifully about Mabon, an 18 year old woman and the very small island, off the British coast, that she is living on in 1938.. She is living at home, looking after her younger sister while her dad works as a lobster fisherman.

There is a real tranquil feeling to the novel, despite the impact of weather and wars on island life. I felt that we got a realistic view of the island through Mabon's eyes, while witnessing students from England arriving in order to record island life for a book they're working on.

I think this novel is beautifully written, emotional and even though it is a short read, it had a big impact on me. I feel like we are given a glimpse into a world that I could never experience and couldn't truly understand from this distance of time and place. But I feel expanded in my compassion for those who live differently to my own experience. This is my favourite part of reading, when I feel like I've been somewhere new (place or experience) and it made me open a space in my heart. A place where this story will mature, for Mabon to grow and influence me in turn.