St. Patrick’s Day rolls around every year and suddenly everything turns green.
Shamrocks. Hats. Rivers. Beer.
And if you’ve spent any time reading Irish mythology—or writing it like I have—you start noticing something interesting.
The stories people know about Ireland?
They aren’t always the real ones.
Take the famous legend: St. Patrick driving the snakes out of Ireland.
Great story.
Except Ireland never actually had snakes.
None.
Which means the story probably wasn’t about snakes at all.
Most historians believe the “snakes” were symbolic. A way of talking about the older pagan beliefs of Ireland fading as Christianity spread across the country.
Now whether that’s completely true or not…
That’s a debate for historians.
But here’s the interesting part.
Ireland never actually lost its mythology.
It just learned to live beside Christianity.
Ireland Did Something Different
Look at the history and you’ll see it.
Holy wells that used to belong to old gods suddenly connected to saints.
Ancient sacred sites with churches built right on top of them.
Stories about the Sídhe and the fae that people still whisper about… even while going to Mass on Sunday.
Ireland didn’t erase its mythology.
It layered it.
And honestly?
That’s part of what hooked me.
Why Irish Mythology Shows Up in My Writing
If you’ve read the Eldritch series, you’ve probably noticed something.
Irish mythology is everywhere in it.
That wasn’t originally the plan.
But once I started digging into Celtic folklore, I got stuck there.
The fae.
The courts.
The strange overlap between the human world and the Otherworld.
It’s perfect for paranormal romance.
Because the whole genre runs on one simple question.
What if?
What if the stories weren’t just stories?
What if the things whispered in old folklore never actually disappeared?
And what happens when someone human ends up caught in the middle of it?
Zooey’s Problem
Zooey—the main character in the Eldritch series—grew up Irish Catholic.
Her dad made sure of that.
Faith. Structure. Rules.
But Irish culture has always had this strange duality.
Religion on one side.
Folklore on the other.
And sometimes the two overlap in ways that get… messy.
You can grow up believing in saints.
And still know not to mess with certain hills.
Zooey lives right in that space.
Between what she was raised to believe and the reality of a world that’s a lot older—and a lot stranger—than she ever imagined.
And once that door opens?
There’s no closing it again.
The Thing About Irish Stories
Irish mythology has always leaned a little darker.
The fae aren’t cute.
They’re dangerous.
Deals have consequences.
And love stories?
Well…
They tend to get complicated.
Which makes them perfect for paranormal romance.
Because the best stories happen when the human world and the supernatural world collide.
Preferably in the worst possible way.
If you want to see what that collision looks like in the Eldritch world, you can start here:
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B09DZ5SRFP
Just don’t blame me if you start looking at Irish folklore a little differently afterwards.
Calling all speculative fiction authors!
If you, like me are an avid reader you’ve probably got a to be read pile that keeps on getting bigger. If you don’t have a to be read pile, I’d love to know your secret to being a more productive reader. I struggle to find enough time to read to get through my pile.