The Seven Skins of Esther Wilding by Holly Ringland

Posted by Ms K on November 22, 2022 in All | 1 Comment

If you are a fan of Hannah Kent’s writing, you’ll absolutely love The Seven Skins of Esther Wilding.

This story is laden with the mythology and magic that Kent does so beautifully but Ringland definitely holds her own and has penned a hauntingly beautiful, powerful tale. My only complaint is it ended because I could have read about Esther Wilding for a lot longer than this story allowed. Ringland casts a mighty spell.

Esther and Aura Wilding are sisters who can’t live without the other. Their connection runs deep – beyond blood lines – knotted together by nordic fairytales and ancient stories passed down from their mother and aunts. Neither can imagine a life without the other until one day, Aura walks into the sea and disappears.

It breaks the Wilding family, especially Esther who leaves their home by the sea in Tasmania lost in her despair and profound guilt.

Aura had left their island home in Tasmania to study in Copenhagen and when she returned years later, was a hollowed out version of herself. What happened in Denmark, no-one knew and no-one knew how to ask but Esther, heartbroken by Aura’s distance, decided to punish her and not meet her by the edge of the sea that night she disappeared. As she walked along the water’s edge she was heard calling Aura’s nickname ‘Eala’.

Esther is consumed with grief.

She returns a year later for a family memorial for Aura and realising she won’t survive herself unless she knows the truth, and secretly flies to Copenhagen to re-trace Aura’s steps and uncover her life in Denmark. All she has is Aura’s diary which reveals seven fairytales about selkies (seals), swans and women. Woven through each of the seven stories are cryptic verses which Aura wrote and had tattooed on her body before she disappeared.

Esther arrives in Copenhagen and meets anyone and everyone who was connected to Aura, a journey which then takes her to the remote Faroe Islands. It is here she learns about the enormous secrets Aura held.

The trip is awakening for Esther as she learns about Aura as well as life in her mother’s native land, how people exist surrounded by the fairytales and the mythical statues she’d grown up loving.

She returns to Australia a different person and as Aura had returned empty, Esther returns transformed. Full. Unbroken.

I won’t say more here because it’ll give some precious pieces of the story away and I think you need to read this glorious tale and absorb the magic and mystery yourself. It might even inspire you to have some of the lines crafted by Aura tattooed on your body too…..I’m rather tempted I must say.

But that is just my two cents worth.

PS: and is this Christmas gift worthy? Absolutely.