Sheena Blackhall’s novella Minnie is set in 1920s Aberdeenshire. It follows the story of a young girl’s passage through adolescence and her experiences of loss and recovery in a society where girls were regarded as second class citizens.

The 1920s was a time of great change in the farmlands of the North East. Even so, the church with it's code of behaviour was still a powerful force and superstition has almost as strong a hold in the popular imagination as religion. Blackhall explores the impact of mechanisation on the customs and beliefs of the North East farming folk. It is against this backdrop that Minnie, the novel's eponymous heroine, makes her emotional and psychological journey.

The Brotherhood of Horsemen enact their rituals within this book, there are tales of the Warlock o Leddrach, and a spirit visitor makes a ghostly appearance by the young girl's sick bed. It is a story that begins in a land of stone circles and earth houses, when the clank of the horse's harness was still a cheering sound, of a young girl's transition from farm to city life and the darkness she overcomes on her journey.