The Dark Side of Mermaids (writing as Ava Morwood)

The lore of the Peak District, a landlocked region, led me down the rabbit hole that become UNTIL WE DROWN. It seemed as if every pool, no matter how insignificant, had at least one mermaid tale attached to it, and sometimes two or three. That’s before I even discovered the delights of the Buxton Mermaid…

But after that, I researched some fantastic watery tales from different cultures and times, ones that didn’t make it into the book.

If you’re interested in just how macabre some of those old stories can be, I put together an overview of the Dark Side of Mermaids in this article for Ginger Nuts of Horror, under my pen name, Ava Morwood. They certainly wouldn’t make it into a Disney movie…

Ginger Nuts also recently reviewed UNTIL WE DROWN, and had some lovely things to say.

“There’s a lyricism here that feels almost like poetry … She writes about landscape the way a swimmer writes about water, with intimate knowledge and respect for its power. The Peak District becomes a character in its own right, with those rolling hills hiding dark pools, all that green earth sitting atop caves and tunnels and stories that refuse to stay buried.

“Until We Drown is a siren song. You’ll hear it before you understand it. You’ll follow it before you know where it’s leading. And when you finally surface, gasping, you’ll wonder how you ever breathed air that didn’t taste of salt.”

The full review is here (though beware, it does give away some plot points!).