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| Author Susan Elliot Wright |
As a reader, I enjoy novels with a strong sense of place
because I want to be able to visualise the setting, to see the characters and
events against a backdrop, whether it’s a grey, concrete city full of high-rise
buildings, a wild, windswept stretch of moorland, or the golden sands of a sundrenched
beach. I like the setting to provide some sense of atmosphere, too, so I can
really get into the ‘mood’ of the story, and if the setting can reflect some of
the themes, better still!
My novel The Things We
Never Said has three different settings: south-east London, where I grew
up; Sheffield, where I’ve lived for the past eight years; and Hastings, a
coastal resort I’ve visited many times. The decision to use these settings was
partly a pragmatic one – they were places I knew, so I’d be able to describe
them effectively and they’d be easy to research. But writing about places with
which I was personally familiar also allowed me to reflect on how they may have
affected the way my characters acted and reacted, and also how my characters
might be affected by being away from the places they felt close to.
I knew when I started the novel that I wanted to write about
the sea. One of the major themes in The
Things We Never Said is nature v. nurture, and I felt that the sheer, unceasing
force of the tides would help reflect the power of nature. For me, the sea also
represents mystery; I’m fascinated by the idea that we only see the surface,
and that as we watch the perpetual movement of the waves, there is a vast,
unseen world beneath, a secret place that remains hidden from all except a few
curious divers - secrets are a big part of the novel, too!
The weather is, I feel, very much part of setting. Like the
sea, it’s useful in evoking the power of nature as well as helping to create a
particular mood. What’s more, it’s great fun to write about! But it was only as
I began to write that I realised just how important the weather was going to be.
As I wrote about the freak hurricane that devastated Sheffield in 1962 and the incredibly
harsh winter caused the sea to freeze in 1963, it became clear that these two
extreme weather events had a huge part to play in the development of the plot,
creating twists and turns I hadn’t anticipated.
This has made me realise that setting in a novel should
never be neglected. It can be as important as the characters themselves, and can
even be a character - in fact, when I
think about The Things We Never Said,
I see four images at the same time: Maggie, Jonathan, the hurricane, and the
vicious winter.
Setting is important to the plot in the novel I’m currently
working on, too. Part of the story is again set on the South coast, only this
time I’m writing about stifling, searing, suffocating heat. Which makes a
change!
