Toil and Trouble

I am so far behind in the rewriting of my next book, that I am practically back at the last one. In fact, I guess that is kind of true as I am still anxiously waiting to check the galley proofs of the "new and improved" American edition of The Summer King. It is due out in May and still hasn't gone to the printer yet! Meanwhile, I am foostering around with research for the new version of The Light-Bearer's Daughter. I'm reading and re-reading old fairy tales for inspiration because I want to create two of my own within the larger story. One will be The Mountain King and His Sky Bride. The other will be The Fairy Queen and Her Mortal Lover. And somehow I have to twist all three tales together like a plait. Sigh. (But I've done that before for my experimental novel, Falling Out of Time, so I should be able to do it.) The books I am reading are: Irish Fairy Tales by James Stephens (with gorgeous illustrations by Arthur Rackham), Fairy and Folk Tales of Ireland, edited by WB Yeats, Myths and Folk Tales of Ireland by Jeremiah Curtin, Síscealta ó Thír Chonaill by Seán óhEochaidh, Máire ní Néill, agus Séamas ó Catháin (as gaeilge agus bearla), A History of Irish Fairies by Carolyn White, and K.M. Briggs's The Faeries in Tradition and Literature. Got them all in the Bray library, mostly from that musty little room under the stairs and the stacks on the top floor where the old books are kept.