This is a book about stories – old stories of people and place, and of the more-than-human world.

A vivid account of a journey through the Scottish Highlands, The Bone Cave follows a series of folktales and myths to the places in which they’re set. Travelling mostly on foot, and camping along the way amid some of Scotland’s most beautiful and rugged landscapes, Dougie Strang encounters a depth of meaning to the tales he tracks – one that offers a unique perspective on place, culture, land ownership and ecological stewardship, as well as insights into his own entanglement with place.

Dougie sets out on his walk at the beginning of October, which also marks the start of the red deer rut. The bellowing of stags forms the soundtrack to his journey and is a reminder that, as well as mapping invisible landscapes of story, he is also exploring the tangible, living landscape of the present.

• Cover
• Title
• Copyright
• Contents
• Map
• Author’s Note on Place-names
• Introduction: The Other Landscape
• 1 Cleaning the Cailleach’s Well
• 2 The Stag and the Blade
• 3 The Loch beneath the Loch
• 4 West Coast Male
• 5 The Bell in the Bone Cave
• 6 Conival
• 7 Bealach Horn
• 8 Cranstackie
• 9 A’ Mhòine
• 10 Diarmaid’s Grave
• 11 Welcoming the Stranger
• 12 Rubh’ Arisaig
• 13 Carlotta’s Eyrie
• 14 Rois-bheinn
• 15 The Post Road
• 16 Poison in the Poet’s House
• 17 Tigh nam Bodach
• 18 Campbell Generosity
• 19 In the Black Wood
• 20 On the Road to the Isles
• 21 Taking Quartz to the Cailleach
• A Note on the Stories
• Select Bibliography
• Acknowledgements