Every Christmas in lieu of sending cards out to the skulk, here at the fox den we sponsor a fox.
With the re emergence of the hunting ban debate we wanted to take the opportunity to suggest that you consider supporting one of the very worthwhile wildlife charities near you.
All over the world wild things need a little help sometimes and these charities do great work with injured and orphaned animals, getting them healthy and back out into their habitats. We think that’s something everyone can get behind.
We take out our annual fox sponsorship with Wildlife Aid, but I am sure you will find a suitable charity wherever in the world you are if you want to participate.
Foxy thanks you for your support and kindness to wild things.
Today Fox Spirit Books brings out a shiny new edition of my tales inspired by Finnish myth and folklore, DREAM BOOK. Inside you’ll find short stories (including two brand new ones), a little poetry and even a play.
Let me tell you a bit about the mythology. The Kalevala and The Kanteletar are the twin tomes of Finnish myth and folklore. The stories and songs that make up these collections are very old, but were gathered together in the nineteenth century as a surging sense of national pride grew. The tiny nation straddles the dividing line between the Baltic and Scandinavia, and had been dominated alternately by its two larger neighbours, Sweden and Russia.
In the 19th century, a doctor with a fascination for folklore, Elias Lönnrot set out to collect examples of the old tunes and stories that people told to try to capture what he saw as a vanishing way of life. In The Kalevala, he arranged these stories in runos to link together story arcs. You can read an English version online, but let me acquaint you with some of the recurring characters who show up in my stories.
Väinämöinen is the eternal sage. After Ilmatar the goddess gives birth to the world, he is the first human born. He knows all manner of magic. I’ve always found it fascinating that much of Finnish magic comes from know the true names of things and being able to sing them. At one point, Väinämöinen faces a young challenger who thinks he can take on the old man, but he gets sung right into a swamp. The panicky Joukahainen offers his sister’s hand in marriage, which starts another theme for the old magician: he never gets the girl.
Aino is the sister offered to Väinämöinen. Her parents think it’s an advantageous marriage, but the beautiful young maiden finds little appeal in being joined to the ancient sage and finally drowns herself to escape. She comes back, however, as a salmon to taunt Väinämöinen, so she lives again. Väinämöinen’s mother suggests he should go north to find a bride instead.
Louhi is the witch of the northern lands. There’s a great split in the Kalevala between the people of the south in Kaleva and those in the north, so they’re always portrayed as adversaries. Louhi, while seemingly as powerful as Väinämöinen, inevitably the stories depict her as “evil” which just sat wrong with me. I used to play in a band called Louhi’s Daughters with my friends Minna and Kasha, who shared the opinion that we were getting a rather one-sided view of Louhi. In our performances we tried to give a more balanced picture of this amazing woman. Our very first performance together was a retelling of the Aino story, which also proved a resonant touchstone for DREAM BOOK.
While The Kalevala has a series of narrative threads, The Kanteletar is a looser collection of songs grouped by who sings them, i.e. men, women or children. There are also a number of ballads that would be sung by everyone. Not surprisingly, one of the songs is all about the kantele, the national musical instrument of Finland. The name of the collection is kantele plus the feminine ending, so you might think of “Kanteletar” meaning the spirit of the kantele, the source of all the songs.
You are probably all familiar with the fuss over the Hugo’s and therefore Worldcon. Well I was fortunate to be invited to comment on diversity in SF and the events scene on The Asian Writer and the article went live today.
You all know that diversity in spec fiction is important to me, I’ve posted on it before, but it would be a real shame if we let the puppy contingent be seen as speaking for our community.
I was recently asked if I could offer any words of wisdom for new writers trying to approach the publishing industry for the first time. Well I don’t know about wisdom, but I do have some words. – Aunty Fox
Keep writing. Whatever else is going on find time for it.
The correct response to any review is ‘thank you for your time’. That’s a much discussion as a writer should get into.
Go to events when you can, meet other writers, readers and industry people. Do it without trying to give them your manuscript
Publishing is a business, consider what you put on social media as it could be seen by someone you later sub to.
You will be judged on the quality of your whole product not just the writing. If you put anything out yourself do it well!
Apparently it needs saying but don’t be an arse. Online or in person try to be a decent human being. Please.
Be present, even a basic website will do but people need to find you when they google you or your book.
You can always improve. Don’t be complacent, try to make the next book better. Always.
Writing is a tough job, publishing is a tough industry. Work on a thick skin and patience.
Don’t be an arse. I know, this was no 6 but it’s important and stands repeating.
Something a little different for you today from deepest Cronwall (where they put jam on their scone then the cream). So without further ado I shall hand you over to your host for the day. R.A. Kennedy.
***
When asked to do an article about Cornish Fae by Aunty Fox, I immediately knew what it was I wanted to write about. Animals. It comes as no surprise that animals are prevalent in Folklore, and Cornish folklore is certainly no different. The relationship between Fae and animal shows that the two can coexist, and their destinies coincide and collide with one another on a regular basis.
I remembered hearing a story when I was in Primary School and since have heard only a few times after, although very different versions to what I originally heard. I havent been successful in finding it any publications online or otherwise. I did however manage to find out from other sources such as friends etc that such a story is within existence. However, the many different versions makes it difficult to confirm where in Cornwall it happened. Folklore is like Chinese whispers i.e A barrel can roll to one end of the street and in the next town that barrel can be something else. Its one of the many wonderful things about such stories. So I took up my trenchcoat and fedora and went into the Private Investigation business. So let me tell you about it, its quite extraordinary.
Sculpture by Marilyn Collins. Image source http://undergroundlore.blogspot.co.uk/2013/09/i-love-spriggans-in-springtime-i-love.html
Romeo Kennedy F.I.
Thats my name over the door. The F is for Folklore and the I is for Investigator, or on a bad day the F can stand for Innumerable amount of things that I’m not willing to repeat.
Tracking down stories is my thing. Stories that lay hidden for years, stories that tell of the Spyrys and all manner of wonderful creatures, among other things.
I was sitting at my desk, late one misty Monday evening when there was a knock at the door. With a creak and a groan I got up from my comfy chair and casually opened the door.
Said she was a Spriggan, told me her brother had gone missing, asked me to find him.
I asked how long he had been missing?
She told me a thousand years.
The look on my face said it all. ‘Did you not think to search for him a bit sooner?’ I asked
Thats me, always try to go for the cheap shot. Needless to say she wasn’t Impressed and the snarl and large hands around my throat told me as much.
Looks like I have a new client, I thought, and I wasn’t in any position to argue.
The Spriggan told me that her brother’s name was Tiddy and he just upped and disappeared one night. Spriggans don’t tend to leave explanations. Hell they never usually leave anything except bones. Especially when treasure is involved.
Before Tiddy’s departure, he would regularly make long distance journeys to somewhere and come back with nets full of fish. When his sister asked where he had been Tiddy said not to ask. This went on for months, until he vanished.
‘Maybe he doesn’t want to be found?’ I said taking a sip of my stone cold coffee.
Apparently that wasn’t the case.
A few days before our meeting she was handed a note by a Pisky named Trevara. I say ‘a note’; it was more of a cryptic scrawl written on a leaf in a watery blue ink.
She handed me the screwed up leaf and I held it under the lamp. I couldn’t read whatever the hell it said but knew someone who could. I asked if it was okay to hold on to it.
That was all she could tell me. Other than: ‘Find him.’ Which was either a threat or just a friendly reminder that if I didn’t I would probably have a lot more free time on my hands, if you catch my drift?
The thing in fiction that is unique is the writer. For this reason, if for no other, we need diversity in our writers.
As a publisher I care about stories, the telling of tall tales, the spinning of yarns, the coming together around a fire and sharing urban myths. A good storyteller is the real world Rumpelstiltskin creating gold from straw.
To me the fundamental reason for wanting diversity in genre fiction writers is the uniqueness of every voice. The richness of experience and the alternatives views of the world and events in it that comes from being a different religion, ethnicity or gender.
I am not saying that, for example, only writers of colour should have protagonists of colour. I think all writers should write the stories and characters they want. Still, as important as it is to have diversity within stories, it is, to me at least, even more important to have diversity behind the story. That is the only way we can truly enjoy the deep, glorious potential of storytelling.
Cover 1 Book 2
This is why at Fox Spirit we focus on stories. In our selections we would rather work a little harder with authors for whom English is not a first language and get the great stories. It’s because we love storytelling in all its forms that we organise live reading events for all local writers not just our own (Fox Bites), which in Leicester is a wonderfully multicultural affair.
Fox Spirit is deliberately open when we do submission calls, allowing for interpretations of a theme to encourage people with different voices and ideas to take a chance where they might otherwise be cautious and while we cannot say we are truly diverse we are definitely bucking the trend in gender bias, which is a start.
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