The Brownie of Bodsbeck, and Other Tales (vol. 1 of 2)

A haunted collection from the Ettrick Shepherd, set in the remote corners of Scotland where the old ways persist long after the world has moved on. The novella "The Brownie of Bodsbeck" anchors the volume: Walter Laidlaw, a shepherd in the Covenanting era, watches helplessly as his daughter Kate slips into the moorland night to meet something ancient and terrible. The brownie of Bodsbeck is no friendly household spirit but a vengeful creature tied to a murdered man's grave, and Hogg wields this folklore as a lens onto an age of religious persecution and family fracture. The complementary tales range across centuries: "The Hunt of Eildon" returns to medieval forest legends, while "The Wool-Gatherer" brings the supernatural down to earth in a love story tangled in class and money. Hogg's genius lies in his narration, these are not tales told by gentlemen but by peasants, their dialect and superstition given full weight. Dark, atmospheric, and deeply strange, this collection predates and rivals the gothic excesses of later writers.