The Sheltie Gazette: Nice pictures & naughty....
Jun 25, 2025 10:27 pm
Hi — are you a dedicated genre reader, or do you read whatever books appeal?
Did I tell you how these silly dogs found my hand-made wool felt pincushion and used it for chase and tug-o-war? The pincushion is significantly worse for wear, and we had to pick up dozens of pins, which were fortunately not impaled in their throats like a porcupine attack. More Sheltie stories after the book talk...
- Q for me: Is the Castle in Kilkenny a real place?
- Logistics and pastry
- Recommended new release: The Witch of the Woods
- Lots of books for you: Myths, legends, and fantasy on Kobo+
- Q for you: How much world-building?
- A dangerous tail: The Shelties and the Scissors
Is the Castle in Kilkenny a real place?
A reader asked me this question, so here you all go!
All of my writing is intimately set in a real part of the world, and the central locations are always could-have-been-but-not. So I have done my best to depict County Kilkenny as it really is, with a the roads where your car touches the hedgerows, rolling hills, houses and farms tucked away. In the scenes in Kilkenny town, I use the real path along the River Nore, the walkable streets with little shops, and also the neighborhoods and schools where people live and go to school.
But the actual nominal Castle in Kilkenny does not exist, and neither does the street where Dylan and Arthur live, nor the teens' secondary schools. I don't want to push my stories on real people who are intimately connected to a specific building. Furthermore, this way whatever I imagine and then you imagine is right.
My castle is an amalgamation of real places, especially in this area of Ireland but mixed in with dozens of houses and castles I've seen around Ireland and England. For instance:
Ormond Castle, set near my fictional castle, was the strongest inspiration. It has a square form around courtyards (can you imagine Maura's talking well here?) and simple lines. All these are my own personal photos from visits.
My castle has a long room like this (Ormond Castle) above the front entryway. Kaylee was talking about cleaning it in The White Deer, although I didn't end up using this room yet.
Maura's fireplace is like this one in Rothe House (Kilkenny), except hers has a wood stove set inside. (These are some of my kids, aged 7, 14, and 16, for size context.)
Brancepeth Castle (in northern England) is privately owned by ordinary people, and it was thrilling to go on their weekly tour. It is, however, much larger and grander than Maura's castle.
The Leprechaun is hiding a library under Maura's stairs (it appears only when he wants it to), and it looks a lot like this parlour at Kilkenny Castle — except with a grand piano and books.
Logistics: prizes & pastry
Speaking of the Leprechaun under the stairs, Hannah's books are coming out soon! The release date is July 15th, and you can preorder here or sign up for my review team here. I appreciate each of you!!
I also have a special request: Are any of you Irish, or even English who have spent time in Ireland, and would be willing to do a pre-publication read to double check my language? I originally planned this series with American narrators so I would be writing in my own dialect, but Hannah, Dylan, and Arthur just really wanted to be part of things. Let me know if you're willing to talk logistics—thank you!
Prizes: If you signed up during Women's Fiction week, you have your free book, but I promised a drawing for more books. (Books for all!) I had a technical snafu with emails going to the wrong list, so they weren't collected. I will sort that out and do the drawing, but meanwhile....
You can check out the scene with the Leprechaun here. It's the second story.
And also meanwhile, I desperately need to finish writing Hannah's second book. June was scheduled to be a busy month and then I had a couple of family and writing-related urgencies —you know, not something wrong like an emergency, but something where you truly have to drop everything else stat—and I can't wait to get back to story telling!
I am bribing myself with pastries.
I can have the first pastry when I send this, and the second one after I get some chapters done.
I'm going to drink the tea now, though.
New Release: The Witch at the Edge of the Woods
First of all, I found this through the FB group Indie Fantasy Addicts, which I am really enjoying as a reader myself. If you like gamifying your reading and earning prizes, you'll want to check out their HUGE Summer Reading Challenge! (I'm in the Mages group if you want to join me. 😉)
I wasn't an ARC reader for this and it just came out, but the reviews have totally hooked me!
Liz does such an amazing job painting this intricately beautiful picture of the worlds she’s writing about
A beautiful and warm hug in a mug.
These are many of the same elements as my books, so I hope many of you love it! And look at that kitty!
Lots of books for you...
Hades & Persephone.... Red Riding Hood... the Phantom of the Opera.... check out these free myths, legends and fairy tales for June! (Full disclosure: some of these look, um, farther away from fairy tales than *I* would define it. But check it out and see what's to your taste!)
...and for something a little different...
Some of you have mentioned that the cost of books is a challenge for you (I get it!), so I wanted to highlight Kobo+. It's a subscription program that for $8/month you can read as much as you want. I always prefer reading on my Kobo, and I see lots of great books enrolled in Kobo+. It's similar to Kindle Unlimited, except it's cheaper, has a different variety of books, and is much less restrictive for authors.
Here's a sampling that some fantasy authors have put together. You can browse the categories like Cozy Small Town, Nothing Short of Epic, Cheer for a Different Hero, and more.
Q for you: How much world-building do you like?
Lately, I've seen a couple of comments about The Squire & His Magical Library that readers thought there were holes in the world-building, especially wondering how books like Sherlock Holmes made it into 3rd-century Ireland.
I've chosen to make this series very character-driven. I do a lot of historical research and clarifying what the fantasy "rules" are, but I try to keep the pace moving forward and the reader fully engaged with the character. I delete extra explanation that slows the story down, and my editor flags more! If you are immersed with a character (especially in first-person) and the character is going through a crisis (which is what story is) then there isn't space to step back and explain how everything works—even if the character knew!
So I was thinking...I could include a page on my website with details about the magical/fairy tale system, or include more bonus material in books like additional information about those rules, or maps of the castle and regions, etc. Would you be interested in that? If so, would you like them in the book itself or go to my website to look through them?
Or do you just prefer being immersed in the world and the character, and it's nice to read some escapist fantasy where you don't have to keep track of world-building elements?
Squire was in the Top-10 Amazon Hot New Releases for Fairy Tales, Mythology, Historical Fantasy Fiction, and #1 for YA Historical Medieval/Ancient Fiction!
ALSO.... similarly, I could do a photo album or Pinterest board like the first part of this newsletter, with inspiration pictures from my own travels. Would you like that?
A dangerous tail: The Shelties and the Scissors
Everyone thinks that Shelties take a lot of grooming, but in reality they were bred to be working dogs in harsh conditions. They don't shed much, and when I've had my hands full with newborns and toddlers, they have gotten by with only getting brushed every few months.
But with young dogs and living out in the country, I've been trying to do a little more grooming. Well, okay, maybe it's mostly inspired by Jumping In The Creek season, and now we are into Diving Through Prickle-Bush season. So they come in and I brush the prickle-balls out of their ruffs, and their ears were just looking so messy I did a little trimming so their faces are more visible.
Adare before and after an ear trimming.
Then with the heat (and have I mentioned the prickle-bushes? 🙄) I was doing a little trimming to reduce matting and overheating, in invisible places, like under their legs and between their toes.
My 5-year-old helped by baby-talking to the dogs while they were on the grooming table, handing me treats, and asking twelve million questions. Thinning scissors are especially interesting—they have notches on the blades so they cut some hairs and not others, leading to a feathered and natural look.
The rest of the family is away this week, so I have to juggle all the evening chores—kid, dogs, opening windows, tidying the kitchen, etc. I heard a little bit of scissor sounds, but kids have all kinds of scissor projects so I didn't think twice about it.
Well. Apparently the Shelties got an extra grooming. Not so invisible.
Do you see it? Malin and Adare got the special treatment, while Inish (in the middle) has markings like Shelties are supposed to have. Our little dog-barber shows that he holds the scissors in a certain hand, because they are both "groomed" on their right side only. Nice clean, flat lines.
And before anyone says, "oh well, every kid has a hair-cutting phase," as a mom of five let me assure you that every child is entitled to one, but this child is so far beyond that. He has cut his own hair multiple times, his brother's hair, and trimmed the white part off the dogs' tails. This is beyond childish indiscretion and well on his way to becoming the next Tim Gunn of canine coiffure.
Inish's ruff gets a star because it is nicely feathered and... you know, symmetrical.
And now, I get back to—
The next word was supposed to be "writing." I was supposed to work on finishing Hannah's story. But remember that delicious pastry that I showed you earlier? A few seconds ago, Malin stole it. So actually I was prying pain au raisin out of very sulky dog teeth (I'm not going to let him enjoy his thievery!) and setting up a major time out in the bathroom. Maybe one day I'll get some writing done...
Best wishes & many happy scones to you—
Christy & the Shelties
(sans Malin. He's stuck in the bathroom.)
