Fate threw a curveball that had us scrambling from the flames of my cousin's house fire to the tranquil embrace of a dense woodland retreat. As I share the harrowing details and our impromptu relocation, you'll feel the weight of the narrative's backdrop—the enigmatic allure of the woods—taking center stage. It's in this unexpected haven where I ponder the profound influence of setting on storytelling, drawing parallels between the haunting whispers of the forest and the tapestry of genres it can paint, from spine-chilling horror to gritty survival epics. Battling against the odds, with the local bar's lively chatter as my makeshift studio, my dedication to keeping our community connected and inspired endures.
Venture with me beyond the airwaves as I lay out the avenues to stay updated on my latest escapades and literary musings. From my personal website to the rich tapestry of social media, your support breathes life into our creative journey. The vibrant community on Patreon rises as an emblem of this solidarity, much like a hearth in our digital woodland. As the anticipation for the next episode's guest bubbles, rest assured, the conversations we foster will continue to bring light to the craft we cherish and the shared experiences that shape us.
Fate threw a curveball that had us scrambling from the flames of my cousin's house fire to the tranquil embrace of a dense woodland retreat. As I share the harrowing details and our impromptu relocation, you'll feel the weight of the narrative's backdrop—the enigmatic allure of the woods—taking center stage. It's in this unexpected haven where I ponder the profound influence of setting on storytelling, drawing parallels between the haunting whispers of the forest and the tapestry of genres it can paint, from spine-chilling horror to gritty survival epics. Battling against the odds, with the local bar's lively chatter as my makeshift studio, my dedication to keeping our community connected and inspired endures.
Venture with me beyond the airwaves as I lay out the avenues to stay updated on my latest escapades and literary musings. From my personal website to the rich tapestry of social media, your support breathes life into our creative journey. The vibrant community on Patreon rises as an emblem of this solidarity, much like a hearth in our digital woodland. As the anticipation for the next episode's guest bubbles, rest assured, the conversations we foster will continue to bring light to the craft we cherish and the shared experiences that shape us.
Hi and welcome to the Writing and Marketing Show brought to you by author Wendy H Jones. This show does exactly what it says on the tin. It's jam-packed with interviews, advice, hints, tips and news to help you with the business of writing. It's all wrapped up in one lively podcast. So it's time to get on with the show. Welcome to episode 194 of the Writing and Marketing Show with the author, entrepreneur Wendy H Jones. As always, it's an absolute pleasure to be with you.
Speaker 1:You're probably wondering why I wasn't here last week again, after I promised you I was back. Well, you are never going to believe my tale of war this week. You could not make this up. If it was in a novel, people would say they didn't believe me. After my flood, I was staying with my cousin. As you know, I was really unwell the last time I did the recording, but I did it anyway. And then what happened was my cousin's house went on fire. I kid you not. So we've all been moved.
Speaker 1:We are currently in a holiday home in somewhere near where he stays. It's part of a holiday complex, beautiful area, and it's actually why I want to be talking about setting tonight, and you'll find out why in a moment. So we're currently staying in an area that's acres and acres and acres and acres of woodland locks. It's got a gym, it's got a spa. It's got a. It's got a. I also got fishing swimming pool. It's great here, it really is, and absolutely stunning, stunning setting, which is what got me thinking about setting.
Speaker 1:Before I do that, I would like to explain why it's a bit noisy on this recording tonight. There is literally no Wi-Fi in any of the lodges none of them and I have no signal. We're trying to do everything on a glimmer of my cousin's 4G and it's all a bit difficult really. So it's hard for me to do things. So I've had to come down to the bar. Now, while that's nice because I've got a nice glass of wine, it's obviously a bar. There are families down here, there are people down here having a relaxing drink, there are people down here playing their children, having games of pool, eating their dinner, and of course they're here and they are making a noise, and quite rightly they should be. They're enjoying themselves. So I'm just explaining why the background noise and I apologise for it, but there is literally nothing I can do. It's either that or no podcast.
Speaker 1:Before we get on to the actual talking about setting. I would like to say that it's a pleasure to bring you this every week and I do so willingly. However, it does take time out of my writing. If you would like to support that time, I would be extremely grateful, especially at the moment with everything going wrong. And you can do it at patreoncom forward slash wendahjowns. That's P-A-T-R-E-O-N dot com forward slash wendahjowns, and you can support me for as little as $3 a month and I would be grateful and it would mean that you like the show and you want it to continue, and I do want to continue with it. Despite all the breaks recently, I do intend to be a bit more regular with it.
Speaker 1:So what of setting? Well, I'm going to talk about one setting in particular and that is a woodland setting, because that has got my brain going in all sorts of different directions. First of all, when we drove here, we drove in the dark and the rain and it was really wintery and there are some lights but not many, because it is a woodland setting. As I said, it's acres and acres and acres of Scottish woodland and it's beautiful, but it's in the middle of nowhere. And when we drove up and it was dark and we didn't know where we were going and we were going around different turns in the road and all different sorts of things. I thought, my goodness, I feel like I'm at the beginning of a slasher movie. Honest goodness, I expected Freddie Kruger to leap out in front of the car any minute. It was really spooky and I got me thinking about all the different genres that you could use in such a setting. Well, obviously we've done one already the slasher stroke, horror stroke, serial killer genre. This lends itself to that beautifully. It's got a real Friday the 13th vibe and tonight I was walking down a very dark lane with just the light from my phone, because I don't have a torch with me and I was using the light from my phone and it was arious, heck.
Speaker 1:The fact that it had also been snowing gave it an even arier effect. It's pitch black. You've just got one light. You could fall over stones and rocks. I mean, I was taking in the whole setting, although it does look stunning, you know, I was trying to take in as much as I could and, of course, the rocks on the path, which isn't a proper path, it's just a mud path, a woodland path all the rocks and tree roots and everything. Seriously, they're all hidden by the snow.
Speaker 1:I could have gone flying, which would lend itself to a real survival tale, and you could just imagine being there although I'm quite close to the actual bar and things, and somebody would come down at some point If you really were out in the woods here, not just heading down towards the bar, it could be a real survival tale or a real Friday the 13th type tale. And so I was taking in all the trees, all the. There was no moonlight, the sky was heavy, heavy, heavy with snow, and you know, I'm sitting here thinking, oh, my goodness, it could be a blizzard. When I try to go back and I've come down here especially to do this podcast because I didn't want to let anybody down, excuse me, I've still got the remnants of my cough. So it's a real. You know, I love the vibe. But survival tale, it could lend itself to horror. It could lend itself to crime fiction.
Speaker 1:Obviously, my mind turns to crime fiction because it's a real. You know, crime fiction is my genre, so I can always think of things like that. But what a romance. What of actually strolling through the woods with a torch hand in hand, taking in the snow, taking in the ambience, the peace, because it is extremely peaceful, apart from my brain racing, it is extremely, extremely peaceful here. And you could. You know it does lend itself to a romance. So you know I was thinking, oh, I could write a nice romance short story or even flash fiction here. I can't see myself writing an entire romance genre, a book, sorry, should I say. But I could write, I could imagine a short story, and I've got one going through my head With the snow. It also lends itself to a Christmas story. So a Christmas book, christmas romance, christmas crime fiction, you know, christmas cosy mystery, all lends itself to that.
Speaker 1:And as I'm actually going to be running an anthology, a cosy mystery anthology, I'm doing it through my publishing house and giving contracts to people. Then I actually apologies for the screaming. There's a child screaming in the background. I'm sorry, I can't control that. Really, as I say, it's for families and I am in a public bar. So I'm thinking of a cosy mystery that I could set here and I'm really my brain's whizzing with that. But what about science fiction? Do you know what? It wouldn't surprise me, with the sky heavy with snow, if suddenly there was, lights came and somebody a spaceship dropped down into a clearing. And last night there really were, when we were walking down, there really were green flashing lights and I don't know where they came from. I still don't know what they were or why they were there, and again, that gave me a real science fiction, fantasy type vibe.
Speaker 1:And this is all one setting. Also you could do, you know, it could be something about fishing. You could do non-fiction on fishing. You could do non-fiction about sourcing holidays, travel fiction or travel non-fiction. In fact, all of these, the whole of this setting could be used for that just wandering from place to place, things to do when you're on holiday, places to go on holiday, you know, the world's your oyster, really, and I would challenge you, what I would like to challenge you to do.
Speaker 1:This is not a long episode for obvious reasons because, as I say, I'm in a public bar and I don't want to be bothering people for too long. But what you could do is what I would like you to do is find a setting any setting and then sit down and jot down as many different stories as you could write using that setting, and I think that could do be a really good exercise and I'm going to do it tomorrow. I'm really going to jot down, you know, the beginnings of different stories I could write using different genres, using this one setting, and I've never thought about that before, I've never thought about doing that, but I'm really, you know, I'm really looking forward to doing it and I think, while I'm here, I might as well use it and I'm going to see how many different short stories and flash fiction I can do based on this genre. So that's what I'm doing this week think about your setting, think about one area and what you could, how you could weave it into all different types of genres. So that's it for another week.
Speaker 1:Guys, I will be back next week. I will try and introduce someone, but it's all dependent on Wi-Fi and where I can be, whether I can borrow someone's house and their Wi-Fi. I'm pretty much guided by all of that at the moment as to what I will be doing, but there definitely will be something next week. So thank you for joining me and I look forward to being with you again next week. That brings us to the end of another show. It was really good to have you on the show with me today.
Speaker 1:I'm Wendy H Jones, and you can find me at wendahjjonescom. You can also find me on Patreon, where you can support me for as little as three dollars a month, which is less than the price of a tea or coffee. You go to patreoncom, forward, slash wendahjjones. I'm also Wendy H Jones on Facebook, twitter, instagram and Pinterest. Thank you for joining me today and I hope you found it both useful and interesting. Join me next week when I will have another cracking guest for you. Until then, have a good week and keep writing, keep reading and keep learning.