The Silver Tide by Michael Tod
The Silver Tide is an enchanting story by author Michael Tod. Published in 1993 it is the first book of the Woodstock Saga about the introduction of the grey squirrel into the UK native red squirrel population and the impact this had.
Front Cover / Michael TodI have a soft spot for animal stories, particularly those like Duncton Wood by William Horwood and Watership Down by Richard Adams, where the animals are portrayed acting like animals. I am less keen on the stories where the animals act like humans – wearing waistcoats, jackets and smoking pipes for example. This book falls into the former category and Tod offers us a fully developed, imagined world in his book. For example, the red squirrels have a folklore that they live by, which is remembered by bits of squirrel wisdom called ‘Kernal’s’. Each kernal works as an arrangement of sounds, five, then seven, then five. For example: