“Tom Dawe tells some disturbing stories in Spirited Away, enhancing the atmosphere with the flavour of Newfoundland and coastal Labrador. From the music to blueberry picking and the vocabulary much unknown to me ... these are the stories of the people of Newfoundland. Veselina Tomova's woodcut illustrations, in dark tones and snatches of light, reflect the very setting in which the fairies appear. These are not your Disney fairies. They are frightening, and Tom Dawe ensures that we know that they are real.
Joint winner of Aesop Accolade, 2018
A young school teacher learns about strange lights in a foreboding marsh; a nurse in a remote outport visits the baby she delivered weeks before to find a devastating change; a woman meets a mysterious funeral procession late one evening; a musician falls thrall to a group of strange little people and can’t stop playing. The stories in Spirited Away are populated by the fairy-led, by changelings, by people who stray onto fairy turf and experience unnerving events.
These literary renderings of stories and anecdotes that author Tom Dawe has collected from across Newfoundland offer an accessible and engaging introduction to one of the Newfoundland and Labrador’s most powerful and peculiar folk traditions.
Recipient of a 2018 Aesop Accolade from the Children’s Division of the American Society of Folklore
Praise