Talargain, by Joyce Gard
This is the book I thought was a Northumberland selkie story. It's actually 95% a historical Northumberland coming of age with seals and a kind of rationalized selkie element, and 5% selkie (who is actually a ghost). It's quite good and unusual, as you can see from that description, but more of a vivid historical than a numinous fantasy.
The frame story is set in present-day (1960s) Northumberland, from the point of view of a girl whose family has moved back there, as it was her mother's childhood home. She meets Talargain, a selkie who lived as a man the time of King Ecgfrith and Aldfrith (late 600s). (In context he seems more like a ghost than an immortal.) He tells her the story of his life, which makes up 95% of the book.
I loved the brief portions of the book set in present-day Northumberland - they're even more atmospheric than the historical parts, and those are plenty atmospheric.
The main story is the coming of age of Talargain, whose feud with another boy gains political importance as they both grow up, who befriends the local monks, who learns that he was adopted as a baby after his dying mother was rescued from a shipwreck, and who loves the seals.
He and his mother make a highly convincing early scuba suit out of sealskin (from a seal who was found dead - he would never kill one) and other materials so he can swim with them, and he befriends them. They're not magical seals - he first meets one because the monks have already befriended her - but they're unusually friendly to him, and he has a lot of delightful small-scale adventures swimming with them.
The political tensions, the feud, his kinship with the seals, and his true parentage all come together when he's recruited for a dangerous mission to convey a message of peace.
This is a highly detailed, likable, atmospheric historical with light fantasy elements. The characters have plausible historical attitudes - they're not modern people in period dress - but Gard shows how beliefs and personalities vary within cultural frameworks.
Talargain and his sister Angharad don't fit into the usual gender roles of the period, but in a plausible manner and in a way which has consequences, both negative and positive. Angharad is sent off to another household learn to be more ladylike; she and the girl who was supposed to be a good influence on her end up both doing all the tomboy things Angharad used to do with Talargain, and learning to read and write. Talargain's lack of interest in the normal boy activities means he doesn't have friends among the boys in his own community, which causes problems for him later on.
I enjoyed this a lot and will keep a lookout for Gard's other books.
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The frame story is set in present-day (1960s) Northumberland, from the point of view of a girl whose family has moved back there, as it was her mother's childhood home. She meets Talargain, a selkie who lived as a man the time of King Ecgfrith and Aldfrith (late 600s). (In context he seems more like a ghost than an immortal.) He tells her the story of his life, which makes up 95% of the book.
I loved the brief portions of the book set in present-day Northumberland - they're even more atmospheric than the historical parts, and those are plenty atmospheric.
The main story is the coming of age of Talargain, whose feud with another boy gains political importance as they both grow up, who befriends the local monks, who learns that he was adopted as a baby after his dying mother was rescued from a shipwreck, and who loves the seals.
He and his mother make a highly convincing early scuba suit out of sealskin (from a seal who was found dead - he would never kill one) and other materials so he can swim with them, and he befriends them. They're not magical seals - he first meets one because the monks have already befriended her - but they're unusually friendly to him, and he has a lot of delightful small-scale adventures swimming with them.
The political tensions, the feud, his kinship with the seals, and his true parentage all come together when he's recruited for a dangerous mission to convey a message of peace.
This is a highly detailed, likable, atmospheric historical with light fantasy elements. The characters have plausible historical attitudes - they're not modern people in period dress - but Gard shows how beliefs and personalities vary within cultural frameworks.
Talargain and his sister Angharad don't fit into the usual gender roles of the period, but in a plausible manner and in a way which has consequences, both negative and positive. Angharad is sent off to another household learn to be more ladylike; she and the girl who was supposed to be a good influence on her end up both doing all the tomboy things Angharad used to do with Talargain, and learning to read and write. Talargain's lack of interest in the normal boy activities means he doesn't have friends among the boys in his own community, which causes problems for him later on.
I enjoyed this a lot and will keep a lookout for Gard's other books.
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