Stories are the thread on which the world is woven, although nowadays, with the meaning being drained from words all the time, the thread is fraying. But these tales come from a time when words still glittered with all the danger of faerie, which is to say the danger of their truth, and in Rosalind Kerven the stories have found a fine teller. In turns haunting, sharp, unsettling and admonitory, these are the best kind of stories and the illustrations are a superb complement to the tales. Highly recommended.