It’s book release day!
Brian Froud’s Green Women is out today, and I’m so happy—and honestly a little awed—to be part of it. I’m rocking my Green Woman Garb to celebrate this momentous occasion!
The book began with Brian’s fascination with the leafy faces carved into medieval churches and cathedrals, the mysterious figures we now call Green Men. As he painted them, he began to wonder:
Where were the Green Women?
Why had they been relegated to the spiritual shadows?
What might these figures look like, and what stories might they have to tell if they stepped out of those shadows?
What magic might they offer?
Brian created more than 70 extraordinary Green Women and invited women writers from around the world to respond to them with stories, poems, folklore, and imaginings of our own.
For me, this book speaks to something I’ve long believed about the power of the unseen realms. The Green Women, the fae folk, the spirits and daemonic energies that populate myth and imagination remind us that we are never moving through the world entirely alone. There are forces beyond the ordinary ego—wild, mysterious, creative intelligences that can unsettle us, enchant us, challenge us, and sometimes help guide us along our path—or help us find a better one!
I think this is part of what makes encounters with the imaginal world so powerful. These beings don’t always offer tidy answers. Sometimes they appear at the edges of things, asking us to pay attention. To listen differently. To remember our relationship with the more-than-human world. To follow a strange thread of inspiration without knowing exactly where it will lead.
And perhaps that’s part of the gift of the Green Women: they emerge from the shadows not simply to be seen, but to remind us that the unseen has always been speaking. Our task is to learn how to listen.
Being asked by Terri Windling to contribute was especially meaningful to me. I have loved Brian and Wendy Froud’s work for years (Labyrinth, The Dark Crystal, and the Frouds’ faeries are at least 80% of my personality). Froud’s The Faeries’ Oracle deck is still one of my favorite oracle decks. Terri’s work has also been deeply formative in my own creative and imaginative life. Her book, The Wood Wife, literally called me home to my beloved desert. These are people whose art and stories helped shape the worlds I love—and, in a very real way, helped shape the writer and person I am today.
And then there are all the incredible writers gathered in these pages: so many extraordinary voices, including writers I’ve read and admired for years. It is a wonderful and slightly surreal thing to find my own words among theirs.
I’m very grateful to be part of this strange, beautiful, wild green book.
If you’re looking for a little more verdant, life-affirming magic, check out Brian Froud’s Green Women.
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