The Pressed Fairy Journal of Madeline Cottington

by Brian Froud, Wendy Froud

Overview

From the preeminent fairy artist and his author wife comes the backstory of Cottington Hall and its intriguing inhabitants, both family and faeries.
 
The rise and fall of the Cottingtons gives us humorous, and sometimes tragic, glimpses into how this eccentric British family became inexorably entwined with the faeries living among them during the late nineteenth and twentieth centuries. When a descendant, Maddi, visits the Cottingtons’s dilapidated hall, she finds herself caught up in a story of intrigue and mystery. While reading the letters and journals of her ancestors and discovering a wealth of inventions aimed at allowing humans to visit the fairy realm unharmed, Maddi slowly becomes aware of the faeries and their world.
 
Also available from Brian and Wendy Froud: Brian Froud’s Faeries’ Tales and Brian Froud’s Goblins: 10 1/2 Anniversary Edition.
 
“Nobody does fantasy art like the guy who gave us The Dark Crystal and Labyrinth.” —io9

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781613123232
Publisher:	ABRAMS, Inc.
Publication date:	10/01/2018
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
Pages:	96
Sales rank:	1,006,144
File size:	35 MB
Note:	This product may take a few minutes to download.

About the Author

Brian Froud, one of the most respected mythic artists of our time, has won numerous awards, including the Hugo Award for Best Original Artwork. Wendy Froud is a sculptor, writer, and puppetmaker and is best known as the fabricator of Star Wars’ Yoda. The Frouds live in Devon, England.

Read an Excerpt

FOREWORD

It was my dubious honor to introduce to an unsuspecting (and soon-to-be horrified) world, the extraordinary Lady Cottington and her now infamous book of pressed fairies.

At the very first moment of the year 1990, at the stroke of midnight, a rather grubby envelope was pushed under the door of my gypsy caravan, "The Flying Fandango." I had been sitting alone, with the last of the Malmsey wine, and had been trying unsuccessfully to open a celebratory tin of sardines. I was then completely unaware of the life-changing properties of the envelope's contents. There was no note or explanation within the envelope, only a scrap of paper.

After many months of careful study of the pressed flowers stuck onto the scrap of paper, one Thursday I noticed that what I assumed was a vegetable or fruit stain was seemingly a miniscule form of a fairy. Imagine my excitement at the discovery. I was inspired to now renew my efforts to open the aforementioned sardine tin, but alas, with no success. 1 had dedicated my professional career to the pursuit of the actual proof of the existence of fairies. Was it possible I had now found it? I lay for days in the dark space of my caravan, feverish, often singing loudly in a falsetto voice the old songs of Marie Lloyd.

The following Tuesday at 9:37 A.M., simultaneously the fever broke, I sneezed, and another envelope was delivered. It was from the "Cottington Archive." I had never heard of it before but I was soon to learn that they were a shadowy and secretive organization. Suffice to say they swore me to complete secrecy of who they are and where they are, and I have completely forgotten the sherry trifle and Miss Darymble's revelations that evening at 6 Mafeking Villas, Dreary Lane, Bovey Tracy.

Gradually the Archive released to me more and more astonishing documents pertaining to the Cottington family. These have been published over the years. The first, Lady Cottington's Pressed Fairy Book, reveals in its disclosures the life of the Victorian Lady Angelica's lifelong pursuit of fairies and the comprehensive collection of psychic pressings she made.

As more and more material from the Archive accumulated — sometimes left in old paper bags on the roof of the caravan, or in rusting biscuit tins under the wheel — the existence of Angelica's twin brother Quentin emerged, along with his early scientific work investigating psychic olfactory-phenomena. His work was published in Strange Stains and Mysterious Smells, now avidly sought after by collectors in the hope that all copies can be destroyed.

(Continues…)

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Excerpted from "The Pressed Fairy Journal of Madeline Cottington"
by .
Copyright © 2016 Wendy Froud.
Excerpted by permission of Abrams Books.
All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
Excerpts are provided by Dial-A-Book Inc. solely for the personal use of visitors to this web site.

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