.png)
I’ve never been one for happily for ever afters. We all grew up with the same sorts of fairy tales; the prince saves the princess and the monster gets slain, but I never quite rooted for those heroes. I’ve always liked my fairy tales to be just a little more twisted, for things to be lost in the search for that happy ending, something that makes the hero and reader look back and wonder if it had really been worth the fight. I think it’s why I adored V.E. Schwab’s 2020 novel, The Invisible Life of Addie LaRue, a tale about a girl who makes a deal with the devil for time and immortality, only to be forever forgotten by everyone she meets.
This is the kind of magic I have fallen in love with, obsessed over; the kind that is accessible to ordinary people living ordinary lives. A lot of my stories are greatly inspired by myths and legends from around the world folklore and urban legends, tales of faeries and ley lines, druids and rituals, cryptids and creatures. I spent my teens living in a small seaside town in Devon, not far from the wilds of Exmoor, and one of the stories I heard about constantly was that of the Exmoor Beast which became notorious in the 80s after a farmer lost over 100 sheep to something that inflicted vicious throat wounds on its prey. Locals often said they’d spotted a large, black cat wandering the moor, but if there was, or is, a phantom panther roaming those hills, it has never been captured.
Tales like this are rife across the UK, from monsters as famous as the Loch Ness Monster, to black dogs like the Black Shuck in Suffolk and a great, bat-like monster that supposedly had been living beneath a church in Cumbria. While I myself don’t fully believe these stories, I’ve always marveled at the idea of creatures like this being out there in the world, still lurking around even as society grows and changes.
This is what prompted me to write my short story, In the Woods Somewhere, a tale about a young woman who ventures into the terrifying woods that has haunted her village for generations with a plan to kill the beast inside to avenge her father. Of course, in my story, none of those who go to slay the beast have ever come back, but because I love a good twist, that isn’t to say that they’d been unsuccessful in their mission. Robin, my protagonist, is the first to find the truth about the beast of the wood, how in slaying the creature, you don’t stop it but become it. The beast is not a monster, but a guardian, an essential part of the forest that helps it to thrive, and without this creature to keep it safe, the woods begin to rot away from the inside like a decaying tooth. Once Robin realizes this, she makes the vital decision to let the beast live, to break the cycle started by those who came before her and allow the magic and mystery of the wilds to survive.
While we may or may not have monsters lurking in our wilderness, we still have the responsibility to protect them and to let them thrive and repair from the damage inflicted by generations of industry and urban expansion. Maybe then, our children, and our children’s children might have the chance to see the wonder and magic of nature with their own eyes, and not just in stories.
As a writer, I want to unearth these mysteries, to hear the campfire stories and whispers of monsters lurking in the dark, to explore the indescribable and untouchable magic that binds our world together. And maybe, just maybe, I can convince someone else to believe in it too.
* * *
As an aside, I wanted to point to another great inspiration for my writing, which is the music from Hozier. This particular story was influenced greatly by two of his lesser-known songs from the special edition of his 2014 Album, Hozier. These songs are, In the Woods Somewhere and In a Week. I’ve noted the most poignant of these lyrics for you, and I hope Hozier's music can help inspire you too.
In the Woods Somewhere, Hozier:
When I awoke / The moon still hung / The night so black that the darkness hummed
An awful noise / Filled the air / I heard a scream in the woods somewhere
What caused the wound? / How large the teeth? / I saw new eyes were watching me
How many years / I know I'll bear/ I found something in the woods somewhere
In a Week, Hozier:
And they'd find us in a week / When the buzzards get loud /After the insects have made their claim / After the foxes have known our taste / After the raven has had its say / I'd be home with you
Comments