From the author of And Side by Side They Wander, Molly Tanzer's Ferry-Loupers investigates the real-life destruction of Scotland's Standing Stones of Stenness through a speculative lens, culminating in a svelte novella that is as much historical folk horror as it is queer Gothic fantasy.
Orkney, 1814. Fresh from the mainland, newly appointed sheriff Alexander Peterkin barely has time to settle himself and his family into their Kirkwall residence and his tenuous responsibilities. Christmas Day arrives, and with it a disturbance that has the locals up in arms: a tenant farmer from the mainland has destroyed the ancient Odin Stone and started pulling down the nearby Standing Stones of Stenness.
Putting a stop to the further destruction of the Stones should have been an end to the matter, but as the sheriff of Orkney continues to mediate between outsiders and an insular community, he unearths old magic, local vengeance, and buried loyalties that the law cannot contain. Torn between duty, marriage, and his complicated bond with the distinguished local Malcolm Laing, Peterkin is drawn into a midsummer ordeal that forces him to confront what it means to govern a land he can never fully understand.