Playing with Celtic Tales

Guest Post by Lari Don

I love sharing traditional tales: folktales, myths, fairy tales. But I also love playing with traditional tales. I find them satisfying and wonderful to share as complete stories, with the wee tweaks every storyteller makes to keep stories evolving and alive. But I also see traditional tales as a sparkling treasure trove of inspiration for other stories. Almost every new story I’ve written has been inspired by images, moments or snippets from those old tales.

I find stories from all over the world inspiring, but I am most inspired by stories from close to home, because I know them best. Stories from Scotland, but also stories from our Celtic neighbours: Ireland, Wales, The Isle of Man, Cornwall and Brittany. I love the magic and lore that’s common to all those Celtic lands, for example strong women, water monsters, untrustworthy fairies and especially shapeshifters. (More on this in my guest post on what we mean by “Celtic”)

There are so many shapeshifters in Celtic tales! Waterhorses, selkies, witches turning into hares to sprint away, a family of children cursed to turn into swans… I do love shapeshifters!

I’ve recently been researching and retelling ten Celtic tales for my new collection, Celtic Folk And Fairy Tales. I’ve loved spending time with those shapeshifters, water monsters, dragons and fairies. I’ve enjoyed following the threads of these glorious tales across seas and mountains, coastlines and islands, lochs and loughs. I’ve been fascinated by the tales’ similarities and by their differences. And I’ve realised just how much this sprawling family of Celtic tales has inspired the books I’ve researched and written before.

My first series of novels – the Fabled Beast Chronicles, starting with First Aid for Fairies And Other Fabled Beasts, contained a few eye-catching Greek fabled beasts (centaurs, fauns, a minotaur) but there were also selkies, dragons, very untrustworthy fairies, brownies and heroes of the Fianna.

My next series of novels – the Spellchasers trilogy – was rooted in my childhood home of Speyside, and contained waterhorses and many other shapeshifters (including crows and toads) as well as strong magical women and lots of curses. (There were also a couple of Sumerian influences, because I like to spread my story wings.)

In fact, all the adventure novels I’ve written have been filled with magic, with strong girls, with the power of transformation, with danger, battles and quests. Much of which was inspired by the stories I have always loved, the stories of the Celtic lands.

Many of my picture books are filled with Celtic magic too: the waterhorse in The Secret of the Kelpie, the water monster in The Treasure of the Loch Ness Monster, and the dangerous fairies in The Tale of Tam Linn. The direct link between Scottish and Irish tales is even built for us by giants in the The Tall Tale of the Giants Causeway!

So please leap into our Celtic Tales collection (beautifully illustrated by Elise Carmichael), to meet the monsters, magic-wielders and shapeshifters who inspire me, and to see what new ideas they will inspire for you!

Celtic Folk and Fairy Tales

Travel to the magical Celtic lands to meet shapeshifting selkies, duelling dragons, a terrifying waterhorse, a cheeky changeling, a cunning fairy and a bloodthirsty giant…

In this sumptuously illustrated new collection, award-winning Scottish author and storyteller Lari Don retells classic tales of myth, magic and mischief.

Elise Carmichael’s exciting and luminous illustrations bring the rich shared folklore of the Celtic lands to life in an outstanding collection that will enchant younger and older readers alike.