"Sussex has more local legends about fairies than any other county in England"

Author Shaun Cooper, aged 62, explains: “Most books about fairies tend to focus on the Celtic parts of the country – Scotland, Wales, Ireland – but The Crew that Never Rests is mainly about the legends and tales of the fairies as recorded in the counties of England.

“It also includes an extra item at the back: A Garland of Sussex Fairy Lore which is over 6,000 words all about Sussex and that includes details of a number of Sussex fairy legends which are not noted in Jacqueline Simpson’s book The Folklore of Sussex (1973).

“The initial inspiration occurred in 2013 when I was researching for my book about Sussex witch legends. At the start of that year I set out to see if I could find any Sussex fairy legends which are not mentioned in The Folklore of Sussex because by then I had already found out about various Sussex witch legends which are not in that book. I wasn’t using online sources but reading loads of old Sussex books, and also I have a complete run of Sussex County Magazine volumes (1927-1956). However, after about six months I gave up.

“Then towards the end of the year I finally managed to get a copy of Some People of Hogg’s Hollow by Eleanor Boniface, a Sussex writer who I had been researching. The book describes a fairy legend to do with the building of the church, and as I had found out that the writer had lived in Milland I was fairly certain that the legend concerned the church in Milland.

“I structured (my) book very carefully so that the order of the subjects would allow me to describe the different Sussex fairy legends throughout the whole of it. Of course, it's not just aimed at Sussexians, I hope that people all over Britain – especially England though – will read it; but with the extra special Garland of Sussex Fairy Lore tucked away at the back I think that some people in the county will buy it mainly for the Garland because, if nothing else, it shows that when it comes to fairy legends Sussex is one of the counties that has a lot – indeed, I would say that Sussex has more local legends about fairies than any other county in England.

“Since the publication of The Crew that Never Rests I have already found another place in Sussex which has a fairy legend, so eventually I’ll be doing some other book about fairies just so that I can add all of the new stuff that I’ve uncovered. But, hopefully, my next book is going to be a re-publication of the ultra-rare Some People of Hogg’s Hollow by Eleanor Boniface (1924) loaded with lots of extras, such as poems and stories by her and a short biography of the author. All of her Sussex work is entirely narrated in Sussex dialect so typing it up was a task and a half.”