The Thread, by Victoria Hislop

In a stroke of serendipity, I happened upon Victoria Hislop’s The Thread just as I am planning a short trip to Greece. And though I won’t be visiting Thessaloniki, Hislop created such a powerful sense of place, that I will look for scenes from The Thread in every port and steep hillside I visit.

Hislop’s protagonist is a seamstress, and the minor characters work as tailors and fabric merchants, but the real thread that holds this story together is the city itself. Its bustling port is the source of wealth and connection with the outside world, its stately seaside mansions isolate the rich, the shops that line the slopes employ those skilled in tailoring and needlework, and the steep cobblestone paths open upon a rich multi-cultural community where difference is less important than friendship and family among the working class.

In my own story, Toby leaves the horrors of the plantation for unknown places—first the dangers of the open forest and then the uncertain safety of the dark underground. I have been so focused on writing plot that I may have neglected the power inherent in the places I created. Yet places are potent forces—capable of motivating action, not just a cardboard Potemkin background.

What would Harry Potter be without Hogwarts—or Murder on the Orient Express without the train?  In All the Light We Cannot See, Werner moves through the contrasting worlds of the Children’s Home and the Nazi military training school, while Marie-Laure holds the miniature Saint Malo in her hands.

Place is a powerful player, worth developing and exploiting.