Beyond the Shallow Bank

Winner of the 2022 BookFest Award - First place for Magic, Legends and Lore - Third place for Historical Fiction.

In 1901, women had few rights and no vote to gain them. Artist Margaret Talbot overcomes prejudice and sexual harassment to enter the male dominated world of magazine illustrating. After losing a child in stillbirth and nearly dying herself, she comes to a fishing village.

Margaret meets many people. An elderly woman becomes a mentor and confidant. Another woman accuses her of being a witch. A man carries a funeral urn containing his dead wife's ashes everywhere he goes and talks to is as though she were still alive. Everyone else in the village talks to the urn as well. One young woman named Sara skips and jumps and sings nonsense songs. Margaret fears Sara suffers from a deep, childhood trauma, but some in the village say she is a selkie, a being from Celtic mythology who lives on the land as a human and in the sea as a seal.

Through their influences and her own self-determination, Margaret strives to discover who she is and what she truly wants.