Grimdark

Last year Shannon Morgan released her third novel, Grimdark. With her fourth book just around the corner, I wanted to catch up on this one first.

Grimdark starts off when Cló’s husband, Jude, unexpectedly inherits his estranged family’s estate in Norfolk. The couple travel there to oversee the new ownership, but Jude’s cruel, much older sisters are there, too. Cló spends her time exploring the storied mansion and grounds, but strange visions are starting to inundate her. Divided between three timelines—the 1200s, 1600s, and now—Cló will need to figure out what happened in her past lives if she’s going to save herself now.

What I Liked:

Reincarnation. I find the topic of reincarnation fascinating, and that was an element I enjoyed here. What are these visions Cló seems to have from hundreds of years ago? Are they vivid dreams… or genuine memories from a past life? Even more bizarre is that Cló doesn’t seem to be the only one with memories of a previous life (or lives); the little girl who lives nearby also has unexplainable knowledge of the past. How do these divergent lives connect now?
Three timelines. There are ultimately three incarnations of these characters: first 1216, then 1645, and finally present day. The initial timeline lends a medieval atmosphere; the second highlights the witch trials of the era. But now, it’s up to Cló to uncover why her life is repeatedly intertwined with these other characters, why they mean to kill her, and what they’re really after.
Creepy characters. The two sisters-in-law? Super weird and mean. The little girl who keeps breaking in? Ethereal and cryptic. Even Cló herself, with her eyes of different colors and her penchant for wandering around at night, isn’t a particularly conventional person. Each character stands out, usually for something uncanny about them. (All that said, I actually like Cló a lot!)

What Didn’t Work for Me:

A bit disjointed. As much as I liked the three timelines and themes of reincarnation, the disparate threads didn’t come together much until very late in the book. As such, there were a lot of characters and themes to keep track of, and little to connect them for a long time.
Fat shaming. Cló’s two sisters-in-law are constantly making comments about her weight, frequently calling her a “fat mouse.” Their immediate hatred and body shaming toward Cló felt rather over-the-top and unwarranted, especially at the beginning. I also wish that Cló didn’t have so much internalized shame about her weight. This element made me hate the sisters even more, but I would have liked to see Cló more self-assured about her body.

Final Thoughts

Grimdark is an imaginative and twisting story of greed, family issues, and women striving to save themselves. I enjoyed seeing the world through Cló’s perspective, in particular, and watching as she unraveled centuries-old secrets. This was my first time reading Shannon Morgan, and I’m excited to read her forthcoming novel, A Penance for Crows, due out next week.

Special thanks to Kensington and NetGalley for providing me with an ARC of this book!

Get the Book

You can buy Grimdark here – it’s available as a paperback, ebook, and audiobook.

Grimdark by Shannon Morgan
Audience	Adult
Genre	Horror; Gothic
Setting	England
Number of Pages	336
Format I Read	Audiobook & Ebook (NetGalley ARCs)
Original Publication Date	July 29, 2025
Publisher	Kensington

Official Summary

Thrilling and melancholic, with a through line of female connection and courage across centuries, this ambitious and evocative novel spans three timelines—present day, 1645, and 1216—in a remote English seaside town where legends of witches and ghosts obscure an even stranger truth. For fans of Simone St. James, Eve Chase and Jennifer McMahon.

Teetering on the edge of the North Sea in Norfolk, Grimdark Hall is both grim and dark in name and nature. When Cló and Jude Honeyborne arrive from Toronto to claim Jude’s inheritance, Cló is unsettled by the foreboding ancient building and the hostility of Jude’s sisters, who stalk her every move.

But Cló is drawn to the strange energy of the treacherous fens and the haunting sadness of a drowned village in the bay where ghostly church bells toll thirteen, sweeping her back into another woman’s memories . . .

In 1645 Euphemia Figgis was accused of witchcraft and burned at the stake, screaming a curse on the Honeybornes as the flames consumed her. Now, flashes of Effie’s life torment Cló at every turn.

Cló isn’t the only one who’s lived before: an odd little girl lurks about Grimdark claiming to be the reincarnation of a notorious pirate, and waiting in the shadows is a darker, vengeful incarnation who has hunted them both through the centuries in search of a medieval treasure.

As echoes of Cló’s past lives converge in present threats, she must confront a final reckoning of old betrayals and relentless greed to end an eight-hundred-year-old quest for vengeance.

About the Author

Shannon has had a nomadic past involving, but not limited to, nearly being shot in Kashmir, playing a marathon, ten-hour game of backgammon on the side of the road in Turkey, getting horribly sea-sick off the coast of Madagascar, and milking a camel in the Sahara Desert.

More recently, she moved from Africa with her husband and their four boys and now lives in Scotland, where she gives in daily to her obsession to write. If not writing or reading, she will be collecting a worrying number of unusual and rather macabre plants, many of them poisonous as they tend to produce the most interestingly weird flowers.