Darkland Tales

In Polygon’s Darkland Tales, the best modern authors offer dramatic fictional retellings of stories from history, myth and legend. This series reclaims history for a modern audience, with Scotland’s greatest contemporary novelists and storytellers taking on the challenge of producing Scottish history 2.0 – a redux of landmark moments from the past, viewed through a modern lens and alive to modern sensibilities. While each book has a unique voice and distinctive individual identity, the Darkland Tales are united by their punky, anarchic and deliberately in-your-face aesthetic. These books are sharp, provocative and darkly comic, mining that seam of sedition and psychological drama that has always featured in the best of Scottish literature.

Coming in 2024

Val McDermid, Lady MacBeth

Available Now 

David Greig, Columba's Bones

The Isle of Iona, 825. In a bloody, brutal raid, Abbot Blathmac is slain on the steps of his monastery for refusing to give away the location of the sacred relics of St Columba, the missionary who first brought Christianity to Scotland. Following a night of rampage and mayhem, one Viking wakes up the next morning to find himself alone, hungover, and abandoned by his crew mates. He can't swim, there are no boats, and the only surviving monk on the island has taken his sword. With only his wits, he must survive long enough not only to rejoin his Viking comrades, but also to find the location of the elusive relics that brought him here in the first place. Rooted in the real history of Iona and its early monks, Columba's Bones is an utterly unique and thrilling read, exploring the clash of early Christianity and paganism, and expanding into a sharp, witty meditation on philosophy, redemption, shame, violence, love, transcendence and reality.

'Stupendously earthy, laugh out loud funny in places, visceral writing' - Sally Magnusson

Alan Warner, Nothing Left to Fear from Hell  A battle lost. A daring escape. A long walk into obscurity. In the aftermath of the disastrous Battle of Culloden, a lonely figure takes flight with a small band of companions through the mountainous landscapes of the north-west Highlands of Scotland. His name is Charles Edward Stuart: better known today as Bonnie Prince Charlie. He had come to the country to take the throne. Now he is leaving in exile and abject defeat. In prose that is by turns poetic, comic, macabre, haunting and humane, multi-award-winning author Alan Warner traces the last journey through Scotland of a man who history will come to define for his failure. 

Denise Mina, Rizzio 

A dark tale of sex, secrets and lies, Rizzio is the story of the shocking murder of David Rizzio, secretary to Mary Queen of Scots. It explores the lengths that men – and women – will go to in the search for love and power.

‘Mina retells this famous tale with great panache and gives it both a touch of noir and a blackly comic edge’ – Sunday Times

‘Stabby and pithy…an intriguing sketch in blood’ – Guardian 

Jenni Fagan, Hex

A powerfully poignant tale of one of the most turbulent moments in Scotland's history: the North Berwick Witch Trials.

IT’S THE 4TH OF DECEMBER 1591.

On this, the last night of her life, in a prison cell several floors below Edinburgh’s High Street, convicted witch Geillis Duncan receives a mysterious visitor – Iris, who says she comes from a future where women are still persecuted for who they are and what they believe.

As the hours pass and dawn approaches, Geillis recounts the circumstances of her arrest, brutal torture, confession and trial, while Iris offers support, solace – and the tantalising prospect of escape.

Hex is a visceral depiction of what happens when a society is consumed by fear and superstition, exploring how the terrible force of a king’s violent crusade against ordinary women can still be felt, right up to the present day.

'This series has already produced two works of note and distinction. It raises the question – if a country cannot re-tell its history, will it be stuck forever in aspic and condemned to be nothing more than a shortbread tin illustration? Hex and Rizzio are showing the way towards a reckoning, and about time too’ – Stuart Kelly, Scotland on Sunday