Literature after 1950

Collections | Short stories | Lisa Carey, The Mermaids Singing | Poetry | Other stories, novels and plays

Collections

Summer 2003 issue of Journal of Mythic Arts, edited by Terri Windling, has a number of articles and contemporary poems and stories about mermaids and their ilk.

Short stories

"Miss Carstairs and the Merman" by Delia Sherman, from the mostly-mermaids Summer 2003 issue of the online Journal of Mythic Arts.

"Ice" by Kurt Cagle (1996). Nuclear submarine's encounter with a mermaid. Also here. Not for children.

"A Knight To Remember" by Kurt Cagle (1996). You gotta love a story that starts "He was a dark and stormy knight."

"Sweetly the Waves Call to Me" by Pat Murphy (1990).

"The Selkie" by Mara Freeman (1995), a Selkie-bride story. This version softens the husband's loneliness by having the half-Selkie children play with their seal mother. Courtesy Ms. Freeman's Celtic Spirit website. Also here.

"Sea Change" by Susan Stern, from a selkie POV.

Lisa Carey, The Mermaids Singing

Amazon. The Mermaids Singing by Lisa Carey. Powerful first novel follows three generations of Irish and American women, interwoven with Irish merrow myths. Like the Canadian movie, and Val McDermid's novel, Eliot's line provides inspiration for the title.

Audio excerpt "describes Graínne's life at home as her mother succumbs to cancer." Powerful stuff.

Info from Lisa Carey's website. Includes an excerpt from the first chapter, and an impressive set of reviews.

Reading guide from Publisher HarperCollins.

Excerpt from Bold Type.

"In this scene, fifteen-yea-old Graínne, following the death of her mother, arrives in Ireland with her grandmother Clíona.

Other stories, novels and plays

Amazon. The Mermaids Singing by Val McDermid. Serial-killer mystery.

Five galleries of mermaid books for kids, with descriptions (1, 2, 3, 4, 5), from Ed's Mermaid Page.

Info from Val McDermid's website . On another page he explains why he chose the title.

Amazon UK. Arthur Dearness and the Mermaid and other Orkney Plays by Bryce Wilson.

Review from the Orcadian, Orkney's newspaper of record, by by Bryce Wilson.

"Gina: Mermaid's Legacy" by Kurt Cagle. Internet mermaid novel.

Poetry

"The Mermaid Sets the Story Straight" by Debra Cash, from the mostly-mermaids Summer 2003 issue of the online Journal of Mythic Arts. Mermaid responds to Hans Christian Andersen's account.

"Undine" by Jane Yolen (1977)

"Part Thee and Me" by Beth Winegarner. Poem from selkie perspective.

Mermaid Poetry and Mermaid Stories (mostly essays) from an MSN group.