A novel by Rosa Pendarves COMING
In a cave at Wreckers Cove: a folded grey something that is soft, and heavy, and wrong to touch. Siren vanishes from the harbour until it's returned. Merryn understands first.
In The Selkie's Skin, Wreckers Cove holds a secret: a folded grey something, soft and heavy and wrong to touch. When Siren vanishes from the harbour, the cave's strange find begins to feel less like treasure and more like a trust broken. Rosa Pendarves gives the mystery a salt-wind hush, with Merryn sensing before anyone else that some things from the sea are not ours to keep.
Readers of nine to twelve will relish the delicious unease of clues that can be felt before they are explained. The language has a clear, wave-lapped rhythm that rewards independent reading but still begs to be shared aloud, and the fear stays safely within reach: eerie caves, a troubling absence, and the urgent wish to put right what has gone wrong. It is thoughtful rather than frightening, with room for warmth in the shadows.
As part of The Polperran Mysteries, The Selkie's Skin lets readers grow older with Little Chough Press's shared Cornish village, where harbour stones, coves and local stories carry their own weight. It touches the series' continuing love of place, friendship and listening carefully to what others miss, while standing alone as Merryn's first understanding of Siren's disappearance draws this age band towards deeper, more morally charged mysteries.