I had optimistically thought I would finish P.D. James's Talking About Detective Fiction over the weekend. I had optimistically thought I would finish a few books actually, but time seems to contract on weekends rather than expand, or is that just me? I'm not sure where the time goes or how I pass it. Gazing out the window? Playing with the cats? Or this weekend, pulling weeds in the yard? In any case I feel like my time wasn't exactly spent constructively, so I can't start any of my new books until I finish my (soon to be late) library books. (There are only two by the way).
So, I am going back to P.D. James for my teaser today. By the way I know I bend the rules when it comes to my "teaser" and maybe I shouldn't even call it that, but it gives me a chance to write about something I am currently reading, and I do like chatting about what I'm reading.
There's so much of interest in the James book it's probably just as well that I split it into several posts anyway. Really she writes about the genre in a very general way, so you are just getting a very broad overview, but it's a nice place to start if you're interested in the subject. And she's so very well read, I feel like I am listening to an expert talk.
At the moment I am reading a chapter called "Setting, Viewpoint and People". I'm all for a good sense of place in the books I read. As a matter of fact I will often look for a book depending on mood with a very particular setting--Vienna, maybe sunny Italy, or perhaps the English countryside. Once again I am getting the view from the author's point of view and it's fascinating stuff.
"One function of the setting is to add credibility to the story, and this is particularly important with crime fiction, which often deals with bizarre, dramatic and horrific events which need to be rooted in a place so tangible that the reader can enter it as he might a familiar room. If we believe in the place we can believe in the characters. In addition the setting can from the first chapter establish the mood of the novel, whether of suspense, terror, apprehension, menace or mystery."
James goes on to give the example of the very sinister and atmospheric mansion set in the middle of a shrouded moor in Arthur Conan Doyle's The Hound of the Baskervilles, and that it probably wouldn't work so well in a more usual setting. The setting can convey a sense of terror and also provide relief from the horror as well. Murder might take place in as innocuous a place as a drawing room, but is perhaps all the more frightening for it because it is so unexpected.
And I like what she has to say about the reader and writer working together.
"Reading any work of fiction is a symbiotic act. We the readers contribute our imagination to that of the writer, willingly entering his world, participating in the lives of its people and forming from the author's words and images out own mental picture of people and places. The setting in any novel is therefore an important element of the whole book. Place, after all, is where the characters play out their tragicomedies, and it is only if the action is firmly rooted in a physical reality we can enter into their world. This is not to suggest that setting is more important than characterization, narrative and structure; all four must be held in creative tension and the whole story written in compelling language if the book is to survive beyond its first month of publication."
I'm guessing this can be applied to a straightforward novel as well. Lots of good stuff in such a small book. I think I may have to buy this one when it comes out in paper.