Rural Problems

When I'm writing a book, I always work hard at choosing the right setting for the story. It's a cliche to say that the landscape becomes a character in the novel, but since my books have a rural background to a large extent it does dictate the atmosphere.

That's fine.  I do a lot of research first to get the feel of the place, staying there and having my long-suffering husband drive me round while I scribble down copious notes, most of which I won't actually use but from which I can pick out salient features.  The notes are always there, though, when I want to check something out and indeed the place itself is always there and I can go back to it for a refresher visit when I need to.

A much more complicated aspect of the setting is time of year.   If I set a book in spring, it will be summer/autumn/winter during the time I'm writing it and that poses all sorts of questions.  What time did it get dark in the evening?  When did the sun rise?  Have the crocuses come out?  Are there lambs in the fields at that time? And can I think myself into a spring-like mindset when it's freezing cold and sleet is driving past the window?

Weather matters are very important too.  Having lived my adult life mostly cities where weather was a 'Do I take an umbrella or not bother?' business,  it was quite a shock when we moved to rural Perthshire.  It is a wonderful county, known as the Gateway to the Highlands, and I appreciated its beauty but living among the hills, particularly in winter, had me constantly checking the forecasts.  Snow could even mean a couple of days when you couldn't get out and severe frost meant cars ending up in the ditch.

The trouble with describing weather is that rain isn't just rain, whatever the time of year.  April showers aren't the same as winter downpours.   Cloud formations are different at different times of the year.  Wind has seasonal patterns.

I can't hold back the book until that season returns to check all that stuff out so I have to spend quite a lot of time on finicky research or rely partly on memory or, if I'm honest, on the likelihood that readers won't be absolutely sure of the details either.

There is, of course, an obvious solution.  I could set my books in a concrete jungle where the only bit of nature that you see is the thin slot of sky between the canyons of buildings.  But I grew up in a little town, next door to a farm and with fields and woods to ramble in and I suspect what I'm writing is my childhood.  Perhaps a subject for another blog!