 |
| A country lane in Wales, the setting of Honddu Vale, book 2 in my Glastonbury Grail series. |
Now
the Lord God had planted a garden in the east, in Eden; and there he put the
man he had formed. And the Lord God made all kinds of trees grow out of the
ground—trees that were pleasing to the eye and good for food. In the middle of
the garden were the tree of life and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil
(Genesis 2:8-9).
Of course, now we
are getting into plot—foreshadowing the central conflict to come, when the man
chooses to disobey his Creator’s instruction not to eat from the tree and so
destroys the trusting relationship they had. That’s called “the initiating
incident” that sets the rest of the story in motion, what Sally Lloyd-Jones calls "God’s Great Rescue Plan" to
redeem all of creation and save a people for himself. (And just wait until you
get to that incredible climax in Revelation when the King reclaims his throne
and evil is banished forever!)
But the whole
thing begins in a place.
The author of Genesis is
pretty specific about this place. Four rivers are named. We recognize two of
them, the Tigris and the Euphrates. Two others, the Pishon and the Gihon, are
unknown to us, but by the description of where they flow, we get the impression
that there was a time when those, too, would have been recognized by listeners.
Eden was a real place with a real geography.
Place gives a
sense of reality, of groundedness. Those of us who write about places
unfamiliar to most of our readers have a challenge to make that place feel
real.
So how do we usher readers through the door into the place of our story?
 |
| Felicity's clock can be seen to the left, but not the figures. |
At the corner of
Cornmarket and High Street [Felicity] paused at Carfax Tower which marked the center
of Oxford. Carfax was the Roman designation for crossroads, and surely this was
the busiest intersection in the city … She turned to cross the street when the
blue, scarlet and gold figures [of the clock] began striking the hour. She
counted to six then the sound of bells drowned out everything else as all
across Oxford, from seemingly every tower, a glorious cacophony called everyone
to stop and look upward.
That Roman
reference tells us instantly that we aren’t in Oxford, Kansas, and the pealing
bells give us a feel for something a world away from the American Midwest.
Knowing Donna, you can bet your life that in downtown Oxford today you would
find the Carfax building at the busy corner of Cornmarket and High Streets and hear those bells. (There
is nothing like an inaccurate detail to rip readers familiar with the setting
from their reading dream.)
We show place with tiny details that give a clue to the larger picture. That’s where precise
language comes in. If I tell you that my character sat down beneath a tree,
each of you congers a different picture in her mind. But if I tell you the
character sat down beneath an old oak, suddenly you are in deep forest in a
temperate climate. I don’t have to describe the mossy bank. You already see it
in your mind’s eye. What if I tell you he sat under a coconut palm? The tree is
not the only thing to shift in your mental picture. Now you are running your
fingers through hot sand. If I tell you he sat under an acacia (and you have
some knowledge of Africa), you will picture not just an umbrella thorn, but the
whole expanse of African bush country with maybe a zebra or a giraffe in the background.
 |
| "Death to Bandits" says this political graffiti on a street corner in Mozambique during the civil war. |
In my first YA
novel, The Wooden Ox, I wanted to
show the country of Mozambique as my family knew it during the Mozambican civil
war in the 1980s. After beginning with action that introduced the characters
and showed how bumpy the road was, I wrote,
The
column of cars and trucks racing across the countryside stretched as far as
Keri could see ahead and behind them. From time to time they passed a burned
out vehicle at the side of the road—a reminder of what could happen if the
Andersons pulled out of line. The coluna
wouldn’t wait while you changed a tire or a fan belt ... There was not a
herdboy in sight nor a sign of a cow or goat. Telephone lines hung in loose
strands from poles at odd angles.
A burned out vehicle, loose strands of
telephone wire—this is not a primitive wilderness, but a land made desolate by
war.
 |
| Luke's view along the South-Western slopes of the Snowy Mountains |
The midmorning sun scorched his bare arms and legs,
the weather unseasonably hot for this early in spring. He swiped beads of sweat
off his brow, his hair damp under his bike helmet … A herd of brumbies galloped
through the pine forest on the high side of the road. The wild horses raced up
the hill, weaving around the pine trees.
We feel the heat through Luke’s sunburned arms and his
sweat. Notice how Narelle shows me what brumbies are without an explanation
that would be unnatural to Luke’s POV.
 |
| Rocky Mountains of British Columbia |
We use place to reveal character. In her book The Man for Her Alice Valdal writes:
A shaft
of sunlight emerged from behind the mountains, striking harshly against her
eyes. She turned her face up. A hawk, already on the hunt, circled
above the meadow. As she watched, it folded its wings and plummeted
toward the ground, swooping in on its kill. She turned her head
away. For all its beauty and bounty, this was a cruel land, culling
without mercy the feeble and helpless. She hefted her rifle over her
shoulder.
In the raw beauty of this British Columbian mountain scene we meet a woman with her rifle over her shoulder who refuses to be either feeble
or helpless.
.jpg) |
| Dawson, Yukon |
It seemed
strange not to be greeted by the cacophony of barking huskies. He noticed one
of the dog chains was still wrapped around a tree, half buried under bits of
decaying branches. Dry brown evergreen needles layered the ground between
exposed roots, their gnarled lengths bending up and down into and out of the
hard ground. … Here and there a bit of green moss clung to greying wood. The
yard smelled of dampness and rot.
The abandoned dog chain, the dryness of the
needles, the hardness of the ground resisting those gnarled roots set a dark
mood. That bit of green moss gives us just a hint of hope, but even that is
squashed by the smell of dampness and rot. And over all we feel the Yukon wilderness. What
different details would Marcia have chosen if Alex were arriving at a new cabin
in that same Yukon with an exciting future before him?
 |
| At the far left a younger me gets a taste of Indian culture in 1965 along with friends and family members. |
We show place with our senses. In the paragraph above, Marcia uses sound (or its lack), smell, and
touch as well as some stunning visual images. Don’t leave out taste. It can be a
very powerful sense. Here Christine Lindsey uses smell to evoke India in Shadowed in Silk, the first of her
award-winning Twilight of the Raj
series.
Tucking a strand of hair into her chignon, Abby
savored a tantalizing whiff of overripe fruit, roses, marigolds and cloves,
mingled with the acrid smell of dust.
Place grounds the
story in reality. It makes me believe it could actually have happened to real
people even if the place only exists in fantasy. That sense of place is
something to be kept alive throughout the story. My story of the Mozambican
civil war could not have taken place in the Canadian Yukon anymore than Donna’s liturgical mystery could have taken place in Australia.
Many of us write
about places we know. The Internet with it’s photos, maps and travelogs is a
fabulous resource for authors who haven’t visited the places they are writing
about. Because readers fill in the blanks with their own knowledge your job is
to be accurate even if you don’t know all the details. That way those
who don’t know anymore that you do can fill in with their own imaginations.
Those who do know will not be jolted by inaccuracies.
Modern readers
won’t sit still for long descriptive paragraphs that characterized the classics
we studied in high school. Our sensory details and feeling for place need to do
double duty to set the mood, reveal character, foreshadow plot or advance the action.
What are your
favourite stories that reveal a unique place?
What sensory
details open a place to your imagination?
