In 1904, in the town of Allendale in Northumberland, something started attacking the sheep. An escaped wolf was blamed, although the culprit was never conclusively identified.
Farmers started housing their sheep, but still the slaughter continued. A committee was set up to try and hunt it down and a reward offered for its skin, to no avail. A wolf was then found dead on a railway line and the story was considered finished, until 1971.
The chance discovery of some ancient stone heads, suggested to be Celtic in origin, triggered strange happenings including the appearance of a werewolf-like creature. This was linked to the legend of the wolf of Allendale. The incidents seemed to be attached to the heads and stopped when they were moved. The heads were eventually taken by a museum for study; their current whereabouts is unknown.
Is this the Wolf of Allendale, or was something else the culprit?
Praise for The Wolf of Allendale:
Author Hannah Spencer clearly has a deep love of landscape and writes from a place of intense connection to the land and all that lives on it. I loved this aspect of the book, and the way in which these details root the narrative and give a solidity that helps hold the more magical and supernatural elements of the tale firmly in place. This is a beautifully written book with a large cast of compelling characters, an engaging story arc and a lot of depth. Nimue Brown, druidlife.wordpress.com/
The interplay between parallel storylines, two thousand years apart, gives pace and depth to a dramatic tale about the spiritual cost of progress. Four stars. Amazon.co.uk
I particularly appreciate the explication of Druidic rites and general Celtic life; the attention to the cyclical nature of existence, and its attendant necessity of both birth and death, is very appealing. Four stars. Goodreads.com