What Lurks in That Fairytale Forest?

We all know that fairytales aren’t sweetness and light – but what if that darker side existed in its own fantasy realm? That’s what Ellie Tilley has done in her new novel, Blackthorn and Beyond – The Sorcerer’s Redemption, and here she tells us why.

Red Riding Hood was lured in by the charming wolf. What would have happened if she wasn’t rescued from his clutches? Hansel and Gretel were tempted by the mouth-watering gingerbread house. What if they hadn’t escaped and were trapped in the witch’s oven?

My novel Blackthorn and Beyond – The Sorcerer’s Redemption explores the gothic side to the fairytales we all know so well in a fantasy realm of its own. Take a walk with me through the spiky trees of the forest – but be warned, you may well lose your path along the way…

It’s important to me to take my readers on a journey. I can only hope I have achieved this by plunging them into the dark fairytale world of Blackthorn. The most cynical among us understand that characters don’t always get a happy ending. Lessons are learnt and hard truths are faced but we all ultimately must face down our fear of the forest and our darkest secrets if we are to understand ourselves a little better.

But what is our obsession with the macabre? Why do we continue to venture into the trees regardless of the danger we know to lurk there? Because, like Alice, we are “curiouser and curiouser.” 

As a reader, to submit yourself to the whims and fancies of someone else’s world is an immersive experience like no other. We can cast light onto the darkest parts of our imagination without it having an impact on our daily lives. We can battle terrifying witches and overthrow tyrannical rulers all from the comfort of our own four walls. To escape into a reality darker than our own is to lose ourselves to another world entirely. In this world it doesn’t matter who we are or what we do. It is an escape. Into the allure of the darkness.

The dark tales of The Brothers Grimm take us down a path deep into the forest. Fairytales have gothic, sometimes gruesome, origins. There is bloodshed, a plethora of inappropriate relationships, and the happy-go-lucky princesses that we know so well today are plunged into despair. But before I take you too far down the rabbit hole in the bottom of that twisted tree trunk, let’s highlight the fact that it’s not all doom and gloom in the fairytale world.

The fairytale forest is an iconic theme of both literature and film. What lurks behind the trees? What is waiting in the undergrowth? These are all questions that the characters in my book must answer. They must do this by facing the force of nature. 

(Photo by Vasilina Sirotina on Unsplash)

And what an incredible power nature holds. We will never be able to fully understand why trees grow the way they do. Or what our natural landscape is going to look like in a hundred years’ time. And isn’t this incredible? In a world where we can predict so much, there are so many things about the natural world which remain unknown. And even in the crystal ball and tarot cards of Grandmother Redlock, it is impossible to fully predict everything in life.

I felt that the unpredictability of nature is why it was important to give the forest so much power over the characters in my book. The natural world will always feature heavily in my writing because I grew up in a little village on the edge of a forest. To this day I still draw inspiration from its leafy canopy. I wanted to take my childhood setting and twist it into something gothic.

Blackthorn Forest is a sentient being. The trees have a character of their own. They are capable of influencing people’s decisions and drawing them in to the twisted paths. Once we couple together the fairytale-like characters and this seductive promise of the unknown, here we have our story. This is where the obsession lies. We can’t look away. More importantly, we don’t want to look away.

I wonder what you will find, dear reader, the next time you venture a little too far off the forest path? Perhaps the world of Blackthorn, where the trees are so thick and so black you can barely see through them. Perhaps they have been waiting for you.

Blackthorn and Beyond – The Sorcerer’s Redemption is now available from The Book Guild.