Just like a gazillion other students over the course of history, I studied Wuthering Heights in Year Twelve. I freaking loved the heartbreaking story of Cathy and Heathcliff, their doomed love but I also really loved how Bronte used landscape as a character to drive the plot. To this day, I have ‘Run through the English moors screaming “Heathcliff! It’s me! I’ve come home!”’ on my bucket list.
Not quite as highbrow, but in The Hangover triology the settings (Las Vegas and Bangkok respectively, ignoring the third one which shouldn’t have been made) also play an incredibly important role to the stories. Those cities with their underbellies and shiny exteriors are as essential to the flicks as the characters of Alan, Stu and Phil.
Stop judging. I like a smidge of foul-mouthed slapstick from time to time.
When it came to my novel, I knew that the beach side setting would be an important tool for the story’s unfolding. It’s an Aussie summer at the beach novel, after all. I was excited to take advantage of all the opportunities that the beautiful setting offered, because setting descriptions build presence and atmosphere.
I love writing descriptions. Probably a little too much, judging by the cuts that don’t make past initial drafts. In my first drafts I dump descriptions like I’m writing Tess of the d’Urbervilles, aka in excruciatingly boring detail. It’s through writing the setting, feeling it as if I were sitting there on the beach, the sun warm on my shoulders, the sand under my fingernails, the cliffs looming overhead, that I can make it come alive for myself at first, and then for my characters, and then for the reader. I also love sensory writing that gives all the feels, like salt on your eyelashes, the itch of sweat moving down your temple, the grit of sand on everything and anything and the light in the early morning when you’re on cloud nine million after the most incredible kiss of your life.
I also really love reading descriptions, and a happy reading moment for me is one where the sense of place grounds the novel. Books that describe Melbourne, or the Mornington Peninsula which are spaces that are so familiar to me give me a flutter of joy when I recognise streets and landmarks. A fabulous read, The Butterfly Women by Madeleine Cleary is a wonderful example, not only of the setting (Little Lon in the 1800s) becoming a character but it also creates the delight of recognition. Even in this historical novel I recognise elements of my home city.
There’s harsh realisties about beach towns. Unaware visitors get caught in rips, as well as physical realities of rusted bicycles and salt-stained windows. Not surprisingly, nor particularly originally, I used the elements to symbolise my characters’ feelings and emotions, but added features to juxtapose them and keep it fresh. There’s an ubiquitous stormy sea (because who doesn’t love looking at an angry ocean from the safety of the beach), but a dolphin cuts through a wave, surprising and delighting my protagonist, Cat, with its whimsical majesty. A walk on the beach on a beautiful day, where the sun turns the surface of the ocean into a carpet of glitter, is interrupted by the sight of a rotting fish entangled in discarded fishing line, surrounded by cigarette butts. It’s a setting that draws and attracts tourists, but the locals call them terrorists and are unwelcoming, unwilling to share their patch.
The concept of setting as a character is one that stirs up a bit of controversy in writing circles, but for me, the setting wasn’t as much a character as it is a reflection, or a mirror, or maybe even a metaphor, if we want to get fancy, and lord knows I do. I never wanted it to be a passive backdrop to the story, but for it to be a vibrant life force that both drives the plot but also gives a reader an anchor point. An Aussie summer by the beach is so evocative and inspires so much memory and reflection of our own summer beach holidays.
The setting I crafted in Summer, in Between also serves a personal purpose: while Batter’s Cove is fictional, nonetheless the novel is very much a love letter from me to the place that raised me, that was and is the backdrop to all my summers.