Plot
Michael’s life is suddenly full of changes: a house move, a new baby sister, an unusual girl next door called Mina and now Skellig. Skellig is rude, filthy, demanding and like nothing Michael or Mina have ever seen before.
Discover more about David Almond
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Author – David Almond
David Almond’s Twitter account
Authors Live – BBC (with an audience from OLHS!)
Themes – universal ideas
Coming of age, faith, friendship, kindness, life and death, love
More to explore – motifs, symbols, context, setting
Angels, arthritis, birds, education, evolution, hearts, loneliness, Newcastle, owls, Persephone, seasons, Skellig Michael, United Nations World Heritage Sites, William Blake.
Did you know?
On his website, David Almond says Skellig is “set in the house in which I lived, in Heaton in Newcastle. The garage at the house was just the same as the garage in the story. ”
Skellig Michael is the name of an island off the coast of Ireland. It is a United Nations World Heritage Site and was used as a location in Star Wars: The Force Awakens.
Further reading
Discover these titles and more
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If you enjoyed Skellig, try these titles:
My Name is Mina by David Almond is a prequel to Skellig.
Coraline by Neil Gaiman is another story of a child moving into a new home and discovering something unexpected.
Wings by James Lovegrove is about a world where where everyone else has wings, and one boy who can’t fly.
Good Omens by Terry Pratchett and Neil Gaiman features very different supernatural creatures trying to stop the end of the world.
Demeter and Persephone : spring held hostage is a graphic novel retelling of the Persephone legend.
Owl Facts for Kids is a short multimedia guide.
Who is William Blake? is an introduction to artist and poet, William Blake
Literacy and Language
Skellig belongs to the magical realism genre. Its plot, characters and setting are all ordinary but there are also magical or supernatural elements which are accepted as normal within the book.
Numeracy
Health and Wellbeing
Rights Respecting Schools
Developing the Young Workforce
