Skellig is deliberately ambiguous about its title character.[5] Almond has provided public answers to some frequent questions from his school visits. The names "Skellig" and "Michael" are derived from the Skellig Islands off the coast of County Kerry, Ireland.[6] One of them is Skellig Michael Island; St Michael is also the name of an archangel.
Almond has acknowledged the influence of "A Very Old Man with Enormous Wings", a short story by Gabriel García Márquez. Paul Latham compares the works in a research article, "Magical Realism and the Child Reader: The Case of David Almond's Skellig". Despite many similarities, he notes that Almond's child protagonists are much more caring and accepting than the closed-minded and sometimes cruel adults in the García Márquez story. Also, Mina and Michael keep Skellig a secret from the rest of human society. Thus the negative social commentary in Skellig, regarding medical institutions and other aspects of adult society, is not as harsh as in Márquez's story.[7]
