As a Contributing Writer for The Fairy Tale Magazine, I am surrounded by fairy tales and folklore! I love the ocean, and I love the miraculous transformations found in traditional and contemporary selkie tales. I chose the books on this list because each one evokes the mysteries of the sea, blending selkie magic with complex human emotions and casting new light on why we continue to tell selkie stories today. Reading is an act of transformation that helps us shed our skins and swim in new worlds, and I hope you will enjoy swimming through the books on this list as much as I have!
I love the gorgeous prose in this retelling of the Selkie Bride story set along the coast of Nova Scotia in the mid-1830s.
The book is dedicated to “anyone who has ever been lonely,” and I enjoy the way the lonely characters learn to connect with those around them. The main character Jean, a midwife who lives on the edge of the village, finds a naked woman on the shore and helps her give birth, unraveling complex emotional feelings.
The book is steeped in selkie legends, fairy lore, and tales of haunted ships, but it deftly explores the human desire for choice in love and the struggles women face as they become mothers. The descriptions of the stormy coastline set the stage for a fast-paced and engaging plot! Love it!
A young woman uncovers a dark secret about her neighbor and his mysterious new wife. Now she’ll have to fight to keep herself—and the woman she loves—safe.
“A modern sapphic updating of the selkie wife folk tale that’s already scoring with readers”—Parade (A Best Romance and Best LGBTQI+ Book of the Year So Far)
“Lush, atmospheric, and threaded with multiple kinds of magic.”—Paste
When a sharp cry wakes Jean in the middle of the night during a terrible tempest, she’s convinced it must have been a dream. But when the cry comes again, Jean ventures outside and is shocked by…
This book is an achingly beautiful love story that had me enraptured from the first page!
The book moves from pain to passion as a young woman known as a “sea witch,” risks her life to rescue an enslaved selkie man. This is a quick read with a slow burn, and I was held captive by the growing romance between two people who come from separate worlds.
I am a hopeless romantic, and I love the way the selkie and the sea-witch care for each other, sacrificing their own safety to heal the sins of the past. The words pulse with the beauty of ocean tides. I didn’t want the story to end!
Love is not love if it ensnares.In the mist-shrouded fishing village of Lochlann, the sea is both lifeline and captor. Selkies, magical beings of the ocean, are chained to fishing boats, their enchanted coats held hostage to ensure their servitude. When Caelan, a selkie too wild to be tamed, begins to waste away in captivity, his captors leave him to die.But Mara, a fisherman’s daughter derisively nicknamed “the sea witch,” sees something else: a fellow soul in agony. Known for her uncanny knowledge of herbs and tinctures, Mara takes it upon herself to nurse the selkie back to health. As…
“Rowdy” Randy Cox, a woman staring down the barrel of retirement, is a curmudgeonly blue-collar butch lesbian who has been single for twenty years and is trying to date again.
At the end of a long, exhausting shift, Randy finds her supervisor, Bryant, pinned and near death at the warehouse…
I was initially drawn to this title because I am fascinated by the Orkney islands north of Scotland, and Amy Sackville’s descriptions of the sea and shore made me feel like I was there!
The novel swept me away with its immersive imagery, and although the characters are sometimes disturbing, they are also compelling. A sixty-year-old literature professor brings his young, unnamed wife (a former student) to Orkney for their honeymoon. He watches her, obsessively, as she stares out at the sea.
I was both repelled by narrator and attracted to his poetic voice, and I loved the way selkie stories framed this tale of psychological drama. Layered with folklore and dreams, this novel made me contemplate the darker side of selkie-human unions.
On a remote island in Orkney, a curiously matched couple arrive on their honeymoon. He is an eminent literature professor; she was his pale, enigmatic star pupil. Alone beneath the shifting skies of this untethered landscape, the professor realises how little he knows about his new bride and yet, as the days go by and his mind turns obsessively upon the creature who has so beguiled him, she seems to slip ever further from his yearning grasp. Where does she come from? Why did she ask him to bring her north? What is it that constantly draws her to the…
I love Jane Yolen’s work with fantasy and folklore, and this collection of poetry does not disappoint! It is a lyrical look at the power of stories and storytelling.
This charming collection of fairy tale and folklore-inspired poems made me think about the messages at the heart of the stories we tell one another. It also made me contemplate the way writers, poets, and artists use different methods to tell similar tales.
This small volume has a lasting impact, and I adored the beautiful selkie poems which lend the collection its name. The Last Selchie Child had me longing for the ocean!
Poetry. Magical transformations, enchanted mirrors, talking animals, familiar tales in unfamiliar guises, all these and more are found in the pages of THE LAST SELCHIE CHILD.
Retellings of archetypal myths and fairy tales and the nature of storytelling itself are explored in this new collection of poems by Jane Yolen.
This is Detective Chief Superintendent Fran Harman's first case in a series of six books. Months from retirement Kent-based Fran doesn't have a great life - apart from her work. She's menopausal and at the beck and call of her elderly parents, who live in Devon. But instead of lightening…
I love the watercolor paintings in this wordless picture book!
This book is perfect for sparking the imagination of young readers, but I enjoy it as well! A young boy falls out of a fishing boat and is rescued by a friendly seal, but the minor details of the story are left to interpretation.
Who is the boy? Why does the seal help him? Is the seal a selkie? Are sea creatures capable befriending humans?
These are a few of the questions I asked myself as I pored over the blue and green seascapes, marveling at their shimmer and light. I have always been curious about what lies beneath the waves, and this picture book offers readers a glimpse of ocean magic!
In a small village by the sea the fishermen are full of tales and myths of monsters, pirates and mermaids, but there is one myth that may be true. On a fine, clear morning the men set sail. Reeling in the nets the youngest of the crew is dragged into the water. Rescued from the depths of the sea by a playful seal, a transformation occurs and a tender friendship is formed. This is a wordless picture book telling the tale of love and friendship across boundaries.
We are all surrounded by darkness. And we are all drawn to the light.
The Orkney Islands north of Scotland are steeped in stories of selkies, seal folk who swim in cold ocean waters and shed their skins to sing and dance on land. One young girl named Isla uses legends of selkie brides to understand her parents’ troubled marriage and navigate her strained relationship with her mother. As Isla comes of age, she confronts the sacred points of transformation found between sea and land, nature and civilization, and past and present, uncovering the key to her identity.
Selkie Moon is a novella for all those who believe stories can illuminate the deepest and darkest waters of the human soul.
Magnolia Merryweather, a horse breeder, is eager to celebrate Christmas for the first time after the Civil War ended even as she grows her business. She envisions a calm, prosperous life ahead after the terror of the past four years. Only, all of her plans are thrown into disarray when…
It's 1943, and World War II has gripped the nation, including the Stilwell family in Jacksonville, Alabama. Rationing, bomb drills, patriotism, and a changing South barrage their way of life. Neighboring Fort McClellan has brought the world to their doorstep in the form of young soldiers from all over the…
