Where exactly is NC setting of ‘Where the Crawdads Sing’? We did some sleuthing.
Almost four years after it first hit bookshelves, the film adaptation of Delia Owens’ 2018 novel “Where the Crawdads Sing” is debuting on the big screen Friday.
Since its release, the “Crawdads” book has captivated readers around the world, spending more than 160 weeks on the New York Times’ best sellers list to-date. Now, moviegoers will flock to theaters to see the people and places of the novel come to life in the film, which stars Daisy Edgar-Jones as protagonist Kya, also known as the “Marsh Girl.” The movie soundtrack features a song by Taylor Swift called “Carolina.”
If you haven’t read the book, or if you just need a refresher, you should know that the book and movie are set in North Carolina — though the movie was filmed in Louisiana.
The state’s coastal marshes, which author Owens placed around the fictional town of Barkley Cove, account for most of the setting. Real-life locations of Chapel Hill, Asheville and Greenville get smaller mentions at various points throughout the plot.
If you’re curious about these North Carolina locations that provide the setting for “Crawdads,” we have information about each. (Don’t worry, we’ve avoided including spoilers.)
Where is the NC marsh in ‘Where the Crawdads Sing’?
As the site of Kya’s lifelong home — which is basically a fishing shack — the marsh accounts for most of the setting in “Crawdads.”
In the marsh, Kya lives among the wild and natural plants, animals and other creatures of her surroundings, leading her to be called the “Marsh Girl” by the people of nearby coastal town Barkley Cove.
Here are the clues.
▪ Marshes + swamps. Owens doesn’t name the specific marsh where Kya lives and keeps any major hints about the marsh’s possible real-life location to a minimum in the book, but we do know that it’s meant to be somewhere on the North Carolina coast. It’s also worth mentioning that while the book notes the difference between marshes and swamps, we do know that the area where Kya lives has both — a key fact in determining where the real-life inspiration for the fictional setting could be.
▪ Easy trip to Greenville. One helpful hint about the marsh’s location is that at one point in the book, Kya takes a bus from Barkley Cove to the real-life town of Greenville. It’s not specifically mentioned whether it’s Greenville, North Carolina or South Carolina, but we’re going to assume North Carolina, since that’s where the rest of the story is based — plus, there’s a possible implication that the bus ride to Greenville from Barkley Cove only takes a couple hours or less, with one character saying it’s an “easy” trip.
▪ County seat. Another helpful hint is that Barkley Cove is described as “the first village settled in this torn and marshy stretch” of the North Carolina coast. Barkley Cove is also described as the county seat of Barkley County.
While these pieces of information don’t narrow down the possible location of the marsh and Barkley Cove that much, it does give us some help.
Our best guess?
Knowing that the area where Kya lives should be near a coastal town, be about two hours or less from Greenville and have both marsh and swamp wetlands, we propose two probable locations for Barkley Cove and the surrounding marsh: New Bern or Bath.
▪ New Bern sits about an hour from Greenville and is surrounded by several marshy areas, as well as some swamp, that open up to the Pamlico Sound. It’s also the second-oldest colonial town in North Carolina — so not the first, as Barkley Cove is described, but close — and is the county seat of Craven County.
▪ Bath sits about 45 minutes from Greenville and is also located near marshy and swampy land on the Pamlico River. Notably, Bath was North Carolina’s first town and served as the state’s first capital. However, Bath is not the county seat of Beaufort County. Bath has a smaller population than New Bern, though, which seems to be more in-line with Barkley Cove.
Other towns that Barkley Cove could possibly represent would perhaps be Ahoskie (about an hour from Greenville), Edenton (about an hour and 15 minutes from Greenville), Jacksonville (about an hour and a half from Greenville) or Elizabeth City (about an hour and 45 minutes from Greenville) — though those areas tend to lack either marsh, swamp or both, according to a map from North Carolina Public Wetlands.
The Wilmington area, sitting about two hours and 15 minutes away from Greenville, is likely too far away and too large of a city to be the real-life version of Barkley Cove.
Think you have a better idea of where the marsh or Barkley Cove may be, or want to explore other possibilities? You can explore North Carolina’s marshes, swamps and other wetlands at ncwetlands.org/interactive-map.
A map of the “Crawdads” coastal setting, including the marsh, is available at the front of every “Crawdads” book and at the bottom of this page on author Owens’ website: deliaowens.com/home-2021-03-29.
Other NC places in ‘Crawdads’: Chapel Hill, Asheville, Greenville
While we may not know the exact location of Kya’s marsh or Barkley Cove, there are some real-life North Carolina places that are mentioned, and that characters visit, throughout the book.
Chapel Hill, located in the Triangle, is mentioned in passing a few times throughout the book, mostly as a source of conflict and distance between Kya and Tate, one of her love interests.
▪ Tate leaves the marsh and Barkley Cove to attend college at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, where he works in biology and protozoology labs under the guidance of professors.
▪ Not much else is said about Chapel Hill or the university in the book, other than it being mentioned a couple times that Tate might be tempted to see other girls besides Kya while he’s there. Tate’s time in Chapel Hill creates conflict between him and Kya.
▪ At one point, Chase, another one of Kya’s love interests, is mentioned as having a Tar Heels flask, a reference to UNC-Chapel Hill’s mascot.
The mountainous western North Carolina city of Asheville is mentioned several times throughout the book.
▪ Kya’s dad, Pa, is from Asheville. His family owned a plantation there, but lost it during the Great Depression, the book says.
▪ At one point in the book, Kya travels to Asheville, marking the first time in her life that she leaves the marsh. She stays overnight there.
▪ Tate also has a connection to Asheville — it’s a site of tragedy for his family, which he says “feels like my fault.”
Some readers have expressed qualms with the book’s mentions of Asheville, saying that it seems the plot doesn’t take into account that going to Asheville from the coast of North Carolina would take several hours, which may be too long of a trip for the errand trips some characters are described as taking.
Author Delia Owens has previously addressed the criticism of at least one of the mentions of Asheville, saying she needed a plot point that allowed for an overnight trip for two characters, as opposed to just a day trip.
As we’ve mentioned before, Kya at one point in the book takes the bus from Barkley Cove to Greenville, the real-life home of East Carolina University.
▪ Not much is said about Kya’s trip, other than that she makes the trip to meet another person, and that she stays in a hotel near the bus stop while she’s in town.
