Myths and Legends in Greenteeth by Molly O’Neill

If you grew up in an English-speaking household, chances are you can name at least a few British folktales. These are what we think of when we talk about British folklore: classic myths that fed the minds of early fantasy writers like Tolkien, Lewis and even Shakespeare.

It’s understandable that those are the most famous stories; they hit all the classic notes of courtly love, dashing heroes and epic battles, but when I sat down to write a book that paid homage to the folklore of my home country, I wanted to dig a bit deeper.

Did you know that Highclere Castle (Downton Abbey if you like) has a story that a mysterious orca used to live in a yew tree in their churchyard? Don’t blink, you read that correctly: an orca, a killer whale, occupied a tree approximately thirty miles from the sea. That’s just one example of the folklore I like, incredibly localised stories that sound totally baffling to anyone who didn’t grow up with them. Here’s another one: Jimmy Squarefoot is a pigheaded figure who haunts the Isle of Man, having been abandoned by the previous occupants, a couple of married giants. You have to wonder what out-of-control prank led to that story!

I reviewed the tree whale and the grumpy pigman when I started writing my book, but eventually, I settled on the equally niche figure of Jenny Greenteeth. Though folklore has given her a name, there is almost nothing else attached to it. She is not even an individual, merely one of many scattered throughout the village lakes, millponds and rivers of Britain. Jenny Greenteeth, Nelly Longarms, Peg Powler, they’re all just warnings to whisper to your children, to get them to stay away from the water.

So, I picked up the name and dusted it off a bit. I introduced her to a witch and a goblin and sent them off on an adventure. They arrive first at the court of the Wild Hunt, ruled by Gwyn ap Nudd and his wife Creiddylad. Such names could only belong to the beautiful Welsh language! I moved from English folklore into Welsh, upping both the un-pronounceability factor and the mythological body count. Wales has its own tradition of legends, compiled primarily into the Mabinogion but also the Triads.

I was also able to pull from the myths for some of the trials that Jenny and her companions are given by Gwyn. The romance of Culhwch and Olwen contains the most famous examples of a hero being set difficult tasks. In that story, the Giant Ysbaddaden sets Culhwch forty seemingly impossible jobs, among them the hunting of the famous boar. I considered setting Jenny forty tasks, but it seemed a little excessive, and I was sure of boring both the reader and Gwyn. I eventually settled on three, with one taking place in each of the countries of Britain: England, Wales, and Scotland.

I reviewed the original stories but decided against a straight retelling. My heroes were not knights but smallfolk, and they would have to solve things in their own way. Another aspect of the myths I wanted to change was the stoicism. In the old tales, the questers simply march from one job to the next with nary a quarrel or unkind word. Jenny and Temperance and Brackus struggle with the physicality of their journey and with the mental burden.

They bicker and argue, and the cracks between them threaten to wreck their plans for good.

There is an additional challenge in the time itself. The Mabinogion is set in a world where magic is very much to be expected. In Greenteeth, the old ways are done and magic is leaking from the world. It’s the early 17th century and religious turmoil is beginning to simmer again in Britain, with the rise of the Puritans and the Civil War only a few years away. Britain is on the edge of a knife, united under the Stuart monarchs but with old divisions only barely patched up. The conflicts of the next fifty years would reshape the island into a more homogeneous nation, ready for industrialisation and empire building. The older stories, the local tales, will begin to fade. In a way, Greenteeth is my way of saluting that world, of recognising the legends my ancestors used to tell and passing them on to you.

Treat your shelves to this monstrously charming debut.