Darkhenge

Rob's sister Chloe lies in a coma after a riding accident, trapped in a forest of dreams between life and death. But when a dark druid shape-shifts his way into Rob's life, despair turns to hope. Because the druid knows the way through the Unworld, where he claims Chloe is imprisoned. Could the ominous black ring of timbers slowly emerging from a secret archaeological dig hold the key to rescuing her? And will Chloe want to be rescued from a world where the landscapes of story merge and blur, and she has the chance to be Queen? Catherine Fisher's new novel combines a fascinating exploration of Celtic myth with a modern quest for understanding. Where is the land of the imagination? And if we found our way would we ever want to come back?

Runner-up of the Katherine Briggs Folklore Award 2017 Winner of the Mythopoeic Scholarship Award for Myth & Fantasy Studies 2019 This book examines the creative uses of “Celtic” myth in contemporary fantasy written for children or young adults from the 1960s to the 2000s. Its scope ranges from classic children’s fantasies such as Lloyd Alexander’s The Chronicles of Prydain and Alan Garner’s The Owl Service, to some of the most recent, award-winning fantasy authors of the last decade, such as Kate Thompson (The New Policeman) and Catherine Fisher (Darkhenge). The book focuses on the ways these fantasy works have appropriated and adapted Irish and Welsh medieval literature in order to highlight different perceptions of “Celticity.” The term “Celtic” itself is interrogated in light of recent debates in Celtic studies, in order to explore a fictional representation of a national past that is often romanticized and political.

This collection of essays is not interested in the unresolved questions about the origin, original use, and authentic meaning of the prehistoric monuments of the British Isles. It is not concerned with their prehistory. Rather it deals with the history of barrows, standing stones, and stone circles: with the ways in which they have been viewed, the meanings that have been attributed to them, and the significant impact that they have had over the centuries on British life and culture – from motivating artists, authors, musicians and film-makers to inspiring ‘New Age’ religions. It is thus as interested in stones commonly believed to be megaliths – like the foundation stones of the chapel in the Dartmoor village of South Zeal – as in ‘real’ remains. In her recent study of Stonehenge, the historian Rosemary Hill asserted: ‘Stonehenge does not belong to archaeology, or not to archaeology alone’. Likewise, this book is not written primarily for archaeologists – or not for the interest of archaeologists alone. It will also be of interest to social and cultural historians, to those interested in fine art, literature or film, and to anyone fascinated by the construction of national, local, or counter-cultural identities. It should also intrigue anybody who lives near one of the thousands of prehistoric remains that add beauty and mystery to Britain’s countryside. The book surveys over eight hundred years of rediscovery, study, superstition, inspiration, fear, restoration, and destruction, investigating how different generations saw their own anxieties, beliefs and concerns reflected in the mysterious lives of the prehistoric builders. By discussing the many different ways in which prehistoric remains have been treated in different periods, the book interrogates any notion of objective approaches to archaeology. Instead, it asserts that what we think of as ‘the past’ is in fact multiple and man-made. Thus, if we are to effectively interpret and fully understand the prehistoric remains of the past, a variety of disciplines and a range of approaches – both traditional and unconventional – will need to work together. For this reason, this book has been produced as a jointly-authored text – a collaboration between archaeologists, folklorists, historians, journalists, and literary critics.

Applying a range of critical approaches to works by authors including Susan Cooper, Catherine Fisher, Geraldine McCaughrean, Anthony Horowitz and Philip Pullman, this book looks at the formative and interrogative relationship between recent children's literature and fashionable but controversial aspects of modern Paganism.

Welsh Gothic, the first study of its kind, introduces readers to the array of Welsh Gothic literature published from 1780 to the present day. Informed by postcolonial and psychoanalytic theory, it argues that many of the fears encoded in Welsh Gothic writing are specific to the history of Welsh people, telling us much about the changing ways in which Welsh people have historically seen themselves and been perceived by others. The first part of the book explores Welsh Gothic writing from its beginnings in the last decades of the eighteenth century to 1997. The second part focuses on figures specific to the Welsh Gothic genre who enter literature from folk lore and local superstition, such as the sin-eater, cŵn Annwn (hellhounds), dark druids and Welsh witches.

Handbook of fantasy fiction for teachers, librarians, parents and guardians and children themselves in which to find many titles of fantasy fiction that they like, or may be tempted, to read. Includes groups such as classic fantasy, comic fantasy, Arthurian, dark fantasy, animals and dragons.