Celtic Noir Podcast

Where am I? In Bonewood, of course. Where else could I possibly be?

November. Exmoor. The beginning of winter.

Water rushing through the woods. Brown, bronze and golden leaves beneath my feet. Dark, wet trees standing against the sky. And T. S. Eliot wandering along the winter path with me by the water …

Poetry, childhood, memory, the sound of water and the sheer joy of November.

Come with me now, let’s walk in Bonewood together.

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Hello. I’m Elen Sentier and this is Celtic Noir in Bonewood.

Well … I thought I was going to take you on a journey into the Enchanted Forest today but the forest had other ideas! I went to the Stag, asked him to let me in, lead me in, and he did.

And then - all of a sudden - we were in the Wilderness.

If you’ve already begun to read my new serial, Owl Woman, you’ll have a bit of an idea where I landed. But the journey the White Stag took me on was not that story. Rather it was how that story came to be made.

I first met the Wilderness when I was about ten years old.Dad had got me my first pony, my little Exmoor, Jewel.She was all of twelve hands two inches, two inches over four feet to the shoulder.That’s about as big as Exmoors get although a stallion might occasionally make thirteen hands.

I made friends with the girl who lived a couple of miles out of the village, at the manor, and we used to ride together all the time over the school holidays, and any other chance we got.

The manor was a big house, very lovely, in about seventy acres that included two wonderful woodlands. One of them was called The Wilderness.

It must have been five hundred years old, maybe more, and laid out in a very special way.All round the outside ran a circular ride, probably a mile long all round the edge.From this a star of eight rides went up to the centre which was an open circle.In the centre of the circle stood a standing stone,And all around was a stone circle of sixteen stones, one each side of the entrances to the star of paths down to the outer circle.Magical!

Yes it was magical. And we knew it was a seasons calendar.

Each of the rides held one of the eight directions …north, north-east, east, south-east, south, south-west, west, north-west …And back to north again.

That’s midwinter solstice, Imbolc, spring equinox, Beltane, summer solstice, Lammas, autumn equinox, and Samhain.

Now, looking back, I think to myself how lucky I was to grow up having access to such a place, to be able to ride there, play there, and celebrate the seasons there too.

It was my Enchanted Forest, my friend’s too.

Long time later when I began to write it called to me again. Told me it had to be in the story, my first novel, and it had an important part to play in the story, in fact it was a major character. And it is.

It showed me how the story worked, how it helped fit all the pieces together.And how it held the centre of the story itself, and the final ending.

I didn’t know that when I began writing.Oh I had a very good idea what the ending was but it was the forest, The Wilderness, that showed me what it truly was and how to do it.

No, I’ve not done any spoilers on you!You still have to read it all to know what I’m talking about,but the Wilderness is the heart of the Owl Woman …

***

Why not go explore in Bonewood yoursef? Hover your mouse over the map, click a highlight. I wonder what you will find, and where the White Stag will choose to tke you?

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A rotting tree …

Life into death into life - that fascinates me.This time I was in Bonewood, the Exmoor part of Bonewood, back at autumn equinox, and this is a part of Tulgey Wood, one of my favourite places in the whole world.This tree, one of many, fell about two years ago I think. There would be more growth if it had been there longer, less if it was newer, you get to know this just by looking, experience, seeing many trees give you the knowing … and that’s a million times more useful than just knowledge!

In Bonewood the kiddies come for walks with us, we take them to see trees like this, and we walk round them as I am here, talking to the tree, telling about the tree, and msot of all looking and watching the tree.

For it is still alive. Oh so alive! But it’s a but different life than it was when the tree stood upright. Tulgey Wood is a part of the great Temperate Rainforest that once stretched all up the western coasts of this continent. It’s the most wonderful forest for me, full hanging green shawls of ferns and moss, creeping ivy, sphagnum, and oh so much more. It the real, true Fairy Woods.

And a lot of it begins here, in the comfortably, slowly rotting wood of a fallen tree. You know it’s likely a new tree will grow out of this old tree.And in the meantime, this old log is home to millions and millions of tiny creatures. And medium sized beasties too like worms and spiders and beetles. Wasps and bees will make their homes, and the nests for their young, there too. Hedgehogs might choose to hibernate there too. And mice. Maybe voles …

Yes, this log, this rotting dragon tree, is full to the brim with life.

Celtic Noir is a reader-supported publication. Most of my stuff is free for everyone, but for some of it - beginning with my long serial story Owl Woman that opened on 1 Nov - you will need to be a paid subscriber. It’s only $5/month!

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For the next couple or so of weeks, StoryPod is going mini-bijou: a handful of short 3–5 minute films and spoken pieces from Exmoor, caught while I was there and still carrying the weather, land and stories with them.

Tulgey Wood is one of my favourite places in the Exmoor part of Bonewood.

As in uffish thought I stood, I hoped to meet the Jabberwock but unfortunately my luck was right out. I did meet lots of other curious beasties but nowhere and none of them appeared with eyes of flame, neither did anything come whiffling through the tulgey wood. I didn’t even get anything that burbled as it came! But it was still a delicious experience 😋

There’s something about that place.

It inspires me so much and, although you may not realise it, is actually in every story and novel I’ve ever writ. Just look at all the weird roots and branches and fallen logs, and critters’ nests. I absolutely know in my bones that as soon as I take my eye off them they move! I almost see it, but then I’m not quite sure. And my brain insists I’m just imagining it but … but I know in my gut I’m not. They do move. They are alive. And they’re sharing their secret life with me … just a teensy-weensy bit.

You get those feelings too, don’t you … 😼😉

Celtic Noir is reader-supported. And from Samhain, I’m giving you full novel-length serials too. The first two episodes are free then you need to be a paid subscriber to get all of them. It’s only $5 a month 🐱

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There’s a hidden path here, one you can no longer walk along … unless you’re young and fit, unlike me!

But I have walked it, last time probably 25 years ago, and that path is central to my Short Story, Sea Cave.

The story’s sort of sad and yet it isn’t, the heroine gets what she wanted in the end although that might not be what we think she wants in the beginning. Walking this path, long ago, and wandering round Kitnor - you likely know it better as Culbone - was what set the story off in my mind.

Kitnor is one of my favourite places in this part of Bonewood (the Exmoor bit). It’s a deep V-shaped valley like all those on the moor, grooved out of the rock by the water. Water is so alive there, limpid-clear or sometimes peaty-brown, and it tastes delicious. And those valleys have their own micro-climates usually full of ferns and all about the temperate rainforest that clothes the moors.

They’re full of fairy glens - we call them ferlie groves - and I’ve wildcamped in many of them. Being there all night, alone with the wild ones who live there is a real privilege, you feel as though they have invited you into their home, that they want to get to know you. Often when camping I’ve not done much sleeping there, just sat in the mouth of my bivi, or maybe under a tree, or the bank of a stream just watching and listening, and hearing what the woods and the water have to show me.

Yes, I meant that, hearing what they show me. That’s how it feels, how it is.

Come with me now for this little traipse beside the stream in Kitnor …

Celtic Noir is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.

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For the next couple or so of weeks, StoryPod is going mini-bijou: a handful of short 3–5 minute films and spoken pieces from Exmoor, caught while I was there and still carrying the weather, land and stories with them.

Bonewood’s heart for me …

The river that births the Dragon Bridge I showed you before. It’s magic here. I’ve been coming here all my life and this particular spot, a little tiny bay that looks across to the Island is very special indeed.

The Island is that stretch of greenery you might think was the opposite bank but it isn’t, the river is wider than this again on the other side of the Island, and the Island itself is as wide again. Just up to the right from here is the Dragon Bridge and that’s a hundred and eighty feet wide … so you can get an idea of how big the river is.

The valleys here in Bonewood are all river-made, so they’re steep sided, carved out by thousands and thousands of years of water flowing through them. That always makes me blink. Water is so, so powerful. It can seem gentle and tame, it seems so here where I’m standing, but it has tremendous force … like Obi-Wan Kenobi’s “Force”!

My favourite river is a Force, and I always feel May the Force be with you as I stand here.Let’s feel the Force together …

Celtic Noir is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.

Get full access to Celtic Noir at celticnoir.substack.com/subscribe

For the next couple or so of weeks, StoryPod is going mini-bijou: a handful of short 3–5 minute films and spoken pieces from Exmoor, caught while I was there and still carrying the weather, land and stories with them.

The Dragon Bridge is perhaps my most favourite place in all the world.

It’s been with me all my life, I was still a baby when Mummy dangled my toes in the water. Whenever I come back to Exmoor I have to go there, revisit, it’s like visiting a loved and revered ancestor … and one who will (I hope) be there for many, many generations after me.

It’s a place which appears, and is a character, in many of my novels and stories.I used to take students there on retreats and workshops …And they all, every one of them, to fall in love with it.Many made that bridge, that river, part of their own initiation rites.

To me … and to them … the bridge is the backbone of a dragon.

Come with me now … likely we’ll come back here again.

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Here in Bonewood, this season, we’re just celebrating the First Harvest, what’s often called Lammas and starts on 1st August.

Eastbourne Lammas Festival

One of the rites we do to celebrate is John Barleycorn, so I thought I’d tell you a bit about it …

In the Old Ways, and here at Bonewood, we know death is necessary for life to flourish, without death life dies. In the past, humankind the world over acknowledged this relationship between death and life and harvesting grain for bread, beer, and whisky, as well as seeds for next year’s crop, through rites and rituals.

The presiding figure was the feminine, the goddess, and the Corn Dolly – made from the last corn to be cut – was her symbol for the harvest.

She is also the symbol for rebirth as the Corn Dolly is ploughed into the First Furrow at the first ploughing, six months later at Imbolc.

I grew up with all of this, and we continue the rites here in Bonewood …

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Welcome to Bonewood

I live in a place called Bonewood, at Hollowbone Farm, with my black witchy cat Kellan, my mad-scientist partner Paul, and a host of Wild Life.

It’s right out in the back of beyond, and you have to walk between the worlds to get there.

Other people might call it my website – but it’s a lot more than that.

Bonewood is a place you can ramble.

It’s a place full of digressions, where it’s deliciously easy to lose the thread … only to find you’ve been handed a much better one than any you could ever have thought of.

So now, on the StoryPods, I’ll be taking you into Bonewood and showing you some of its places and stories.

I wasn’t sure which one to set off with and then The Lane grabbed me.

We call it … The Lane Nobody Notices because it really is.

It’s small, quiet, and you can’t see where it’s going to take you, and it can be a bit rough underfoot. When you do notice and glance down it you get a feel in your bones that it might just take you where you need to go, even if you don’t know where that is, not yet, and provided you’re not in a hurry.

How about we go there now? Yes ?

Right then … off we go …

Want to visit Bonewood? Click HERE … scroll down to the Map mouse-over the places and click a Hotspot 😺

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