When Miriam is on her death bed at the hospital, she asks Gemma to tell her a selkie story (Livesey 111). Gemma starts the story, positioning it as a woman living in the village by the sea. According to the OED, the selkie story is "also, in folklore, a creature or spirit having the appearance of a seal; spec. one able to assume human form” (“sealkie”). Elisabeth Gifford is a prose writer who also reflects on and has an interest in the selkie story. She writes, "The legend of the Selkie is told along the Western coast of Scotland and as far down as Ireland. Selkies are seals in the water, but once on land, they take off their skins and become human. If an ordinary mortal sees a Selkie in human form, they will inevitably fall in love. The Selkie legend has several variations but never ends happily. The husband or wife of a Selkie may hide away their seal skins, but once their hiding place is discovered the Selkie is powerless to resist the call of the sea. He slides back into his skins and departs, leaving behind any children" (Gifford). In this context, the selkie legend frames the plot of a Jane Eyre spinoff perfectly. The legend’s storyline aligns with Jane Eyre, as well as Gemma’s story in The Flight of Gemma Hardy.

Bibliography: Gifford, Elisabeth. The Secret History Hidden in the Selkie Story. 3 May 2014, http://www.elisabethgifford.com/blog/2014/5/3/the-secret-history-hidden-.... Accessed 25 Sept. 2019.

Livesey, Margot. The Flight of Gemma Hardy. HarperCollins, 2012.

"sealkie, n.1." OED Online, Oxford University Press, Sept. 2019, https://www-oed-com.login.library.coastal.edu:8443/view/Entry/174211?red.... Accessed 13 Sept. 2019.