Location, location... Oh rats!

By Jude Mason

It's all in the location, or so many readers would have us believe. Personally, I tend to think location is fun to play with, but not necessarily a big deal. I rarely use a real place for my books. I like to keep my fantasies just that - Fantasies!

For years, when I wrote it was about the area around me. When I got published, that didn't change a lot, but I did tend to give more description of the surroundings. Not a lot, my characters were still more important than the color of the living room furniture or how many chairs sat around the dining table

I think the more I wrote, the more detail and information on local wormed its way into my books. I still didn't, and don't to this day, trouble myself with real locations unless I need them for some reason.

Whisker's Seaside Inn was an exception. Yes, it's a real location, but it's got nothing to do with our gayer than gay owner and his lover. This is actually a pub not too far from where I live and it's gorgeous don't you think? The owners? I really have no idea, but they ain't Ethan or Cade.

In a book I wrote some time ago, Cat's Claw, I stuck to what I knew and used both fauna and flora I knew well. The story called for that and I adored sharing bits of my knowledge of the local wildlife and the seasons with readers who bought the book. When I needed my 'cats' to race through the underbrush, I knew what it would be like because I'd done it.

When Morgan was tramping through the forest to get to Joshua's cabin, I knew the smells and feel of the loam like it was right here. I could take my readers there and let them sink into the real meat of the book.

The location of the story has grown in importance, but there's always a balance and a right/wrong way to dish it out. Doing it the wrong way, well, it's what I call a laundry list of showing. Something like this:

Jenna walked through the door Garce held open for her and stepped onto the softest, wall-to-wall, gold plush carpeting she'd ever had the privilege of walking on. The pale tan walls with the four large windows all in a row across from her, delicately curtained in white lace tied with deep blue ribbons made her heart flutter. Taking another step, she blinked at the large, brown leather sofa and its two matching recliner, one on either side and all facing the enormous red brick fireplace.

Oh My!

Now, doesn't that make you dizzy?

Imagine if the book had started out that way and every time Jenna and Garce went somewhere, their car... a brilliant blue, four door Eldarado, with black leather interior... ad nauseum! They live in a duplex, in a town, in the state of... you could go nuts. Hell, the story would be all location and no fun - no hanky panky - just no fun at all. Yet, you want to know this stuff, just not all at once. A dabble of color, a hint of what size the room is, hot, cold, is there a smell? Is the street clean, the trees green? Those are tremendously important as you go along, but not as an info dump.

Here's the opening for Scorpio Tattoo, one of my all time fav books:

He sat bolt upright. His heart pounded. Sweat poured down his face. Eyes wide, he stared into the darkness, searching for what had wrenched him from a sound sleep. Then, he remembered the dream.

"Damn!" Jonathan Rorke cursed. Sitting cross-legged in his huge, king-sized bed, he dragged shaking fingers through the wavy, dark shoulder-length hair plastered to his forehead and neck. He shuddered as the cool night air brushed his naked chest.

Visions of the dream tumbled through his mind. An eerie night, a moonlit night, a park surrounded by a forest of evergreens. The woman, the same one he'd seen a dozen times before, lying nearly naked on the grass, her long black hair spread out around her head and shoulders like a halo. Her eyes were closed, her brow furrowed ever so slightly. She was on her side, one arm bent underneath her, the other stretched out before her.

Her ankles were crossed, and she lay partially on her stomach. She was naked to her lower back, breasts plump, tipped with dark nipples raised to sharp points by the chill night air.

You still get information on location, but you get so much more. Emotion, mystery, a sense of his adoration for her before he'd even really seen her. Oh yeah, and fear. When he sat up, his heart raced, sweat poured off him. But, we still know where he is. Not the town, not the street name or anything, because it's not needed, yet. If at all. Some stories you never need it, some you want to know it all. That's what edits are for and re-writes...LOL!

Hope that all made sense. What do you all think? Do you want to know THAT much about your characters? Where they live? Where they work? What color their cars are? Where they came from?