“Rachael King offers magic, mystery and beautifully crafted prose for a young adult audience with her new novel, Song of the Saltings. This folk horror adventure is both delightful and deliciously creepy, with a compelling heroine who bucks tradition to seek out the truth behind the customs of her marshland home and forces us to ask the question: Who and what is truly monstrous?”
Description
The Scorpio Races meets The Girl Who Fell Beneath the Sea in this “eerie…atmospheric” (School Library Journal, starred review) young adult fantasy about a girl who must defy tradition to save her beloved island from the monstrous forces that are tearing it apart.
On the isolated island of Brack, the people live by an ancient bargain: every year, a sacrifice must be made to the Glimm, the creature that haunts the salt marshes. Once, it demanded children. Eight years ago, it should have taken Lotta. Instead, the monster spared her and claimed her pony, shattering tradition and anointing her both folk hero and object of suspicion.
Now sixteen, Lotta tends the Council’s sacrificial horses, keeping her distance from the islanders who whisper about her fate. But something is stirring. The island hums beneath her feet, and a song threads through her dreams. Is the Glimm calling Lotta back?
When she crosses paths with Moss—a boy once hidden from sacrifice—a daring bog rescue sparks a chain of events that forces them both to question the Council’s rule and the lore that binds their people. As crops and animals are blighted and uncanny weather plagues the community, Lotta and Moss must decide whether to obey the Council or risk everything to uncover the island’s deepest secrets.
Because on Brack, monsters come in many forms.
Reviews
“Like the very best fantasy, Song of the Saltings speaks to and of the real world. That is what gives it its power.”
“You had me at ‘bog witch’. A lyrical and haunting ballad of bleak salt flats, buried secrets and deep, ancient magic –– I devoured it.”
