Midnight and Moonshine

Midnight and Moonshine begins with the evocative and bloody story of the flight of Mymnir, one of Allfather Odin’s ravens, escaping from Asgard as Ragnarök destroys the gods. In Hannett’s and Slatter’s mosaic of short stories, Mymnir is the white raven, a creature of magic and memory, who flees the wreckage of her old world, re-making herself as a woman and a queen on the shores of the new world. She brings splinters of Asgard with her, creating a new people – the Fae – and a new realm for herself.

As time passes, some Fae break free of Mymnir’s power, and the magical Fae blood mingles with human blood through the ages: they mix with the skraelings of the new world, they marry into human families, but their magic and show more otherness remains, even if it is diluted.

Hannett and Slatter’s writing is entrancing and evocative, their tales shifting between brutal and enigmatic, frightening and enchanting, dark and light. The stories follow Mymnir and the Fae through the ages, from the distant past into our own time, and towards the end of the book, the white raven, the Fae queen – lost for many years – appears in our present day and brings new destruction down upon the world, as some of her Fae descendents try to stop her.

Midnight and Moonshine is a fantastic read, a highly recommended collection of uniquely imagined fantasy tales, with prose that is a joy to read. show less