The forests, lakes, mountains, and farms of Sweden have never been entirely empty.

For generations, people have told stories about the beings who share these places with us. The tomte guarded the farm, the älvor danced across the meadows, Näcken played his fiddle near dangerous waters, and trolls lived inside mountains that ordinary eyes mistook for stone. Some of these beings offered protection, while others reminded people to respect the boundaries between the human world and the hidden one.

I was raised with these stories. They were connected to the forests around me, the streams near my school, and the warnings I heard as a child. For me, they became more than simple tales. They formed a connection between the old and the new, the past and the present, and the landscape and the people living within it.

In Among Friendly Elves, Gnomes & Trolls, I invite you on a journey through Swedish folklore and the beings that have inhabited our stories for centuries. We will meet household guardians, forest spirits, hidden people, dangerous water beings, restless dead, giants, dragons, and many others.

The book also asks where these traditions came from, how they changed under Christianity, and what connection they may have to the older Norse worldview. As a Norse Pagan, I approach these stories with respect, but also with honesty. Modern beliefs will not be presented as ancient facts, and uncertainty will not be hidden from the reader.

Whether you approach these stories through faith, history, ancestral memory, or simple curiosity, the first lesson remains the same:

Listen and reflect before deciding what the landscape contains.