I was at the Skye Museum of Island Life when I saw this book – given that I love legends and folklore, I knew that I had to have this as a souvenir of our time in Skye. Obviously, I wasn’t disappointed; this was a delightful book that took me through time and back to Skye.

Skye: The Island and Its Legends is a pretty old book with a timeless feel. It’s a tour of the legends of Skye, shown to us by touring the island itself. The book starts in Kyleakin and heads towards Portree before going around North Skye and then heading down to South Skye. As the book heads around the island, Swire points out relevant bits of history and legends. Many of the stories were told to her by her family, passed down from generation to generation, others are common legends, and still others are rooted in historical fact.

The book also has an introduction but you can probably skip that. It’s pretty academic (as opposed to the more casual tone in the book) and talks about the history of the book and its impact on the person writing the introduction. It’s interesting, but I liked the book more so if you just want to enjoy the history and legends of Skye, feel free to start from chapter one.

My favourite thing about this book was its narrative style. Although the book hops through time – from recent(ish) past to a couple of hundred years ago, the prose was very smooth and I had no problem following the journey she takes us through. The smooth transitions reminded me of In The Land of Giants (though I think Skye is the older book), which was a pleasant change from the confusion I experienced in Adventures on the High Teas.

I was also really excited to see the places that I visited, such as Dunvegan. The guide talks about the Fairy flag and it was very interesting to get more detail about the flag and its history. The fact that some of the things in the book was taken from the Official Guide to Dunvegan makes me wish that I got that official guide as well.

This was a fantastic book. I absolutely enjoyed it and I wish that I read it earlier. Actually, what I really want to do is to go back to Skye and explore it with this book as my guide – I know things would have changed since then, but I’m sure enough has stayed the same.