Love the idea of this post, I also love when a book has a strong sense of place! And I'm located in Barcelona, Spain, never moved from here though! Cheers 💛
I love this concept of sense of place. I'm originally from outside Inverness in the Scottish Highlands and although I left to go to University when I was 18 and have never lived there permanently since, it's still where I regard myself as being "From". I now live in Edinburgh and have lived here longer than anywhere else in my life. I love it but I am still from the Highlands.
I also really resonate with books which convey a string sense of place, particularly if that is a rural place!
This was a great idea for a post - I'd never heard of the Driftless Region or why it's called that, so thanks for that. I grew up in a town next to Arlington Heights! I've lived in IL and CO and man, CO real estate is bonkers. I wouldn't go back for that reason, and others. We are back in a small IL town where the movie Groundhog Day was filmed, with a cobblestone square and an opera house, and we love it here.
As for fantasy and sci fi, that's part of why I love reading it--it's similar but different. I can read about hard things in a fantasy setting but can't read war novels. The cruelty cuts too close.
I am so similar! I have never lived in a city either and definitely identify best with small town life in books like my hometown, which was just 3000 people and honestly pretty idyllic. Now I'm in an adorable seaside town of around 12,000 that my stepdad sometimes refers to as "Pleasantville" and honestly he's not wrong. I also love a feeling of place in books and definitely gravitate most to books that involve the outdoors. I also cannot get into most fantasy books and maybe your reasoning is why! I will have to think more on that. :)
I love this! A strong sense of place always bumps up a book a notch in my estimation. I grew up in San Francisco, lived in Boston for a while, and now live in New York City. I was never super attached to Boston while I was living there but I read a romance theoretically set there last year and there was zero sense of place and I was weirdly ready to defend the city's honor?
This is fascinating! While I do connect more if a book takes place somewhere I've been, I don't mind books that have made up fictional places, especially if the author takes great care to make a whole community and it seems like it actually exists. Like you I struggle with fantasy worlds because they aren't built on actual places (plus all the names is just too much for me I need more realism). I always enjoy hearing where people grew up. I'm from a small college town and we moved once when I was in HS from one end of town to the other, a whole 1.5 miles. And then when I moved out after college until now (about 22 years) I've lived in 11 different homes. So moving around a lot as an adult has been weird when I was in the same place my whole childhood (I've lived in only 2 different states, but 5 cities). My fave is my parents who spent their entire lives in the same small town/area and in retirement moved to the St. Louis area. Most people don't do that in retirement, but that's where all the grandkids are.
I have long told my husband, who is from a small town on the border of Indiana and Kentucky, that I will do whatever he wants with his body when he is dead, but I need my remains to stay in Wisconsin with or without him, no matter what. I have been lucky enough to travel all around the world but this is the place I come from and it's the place I belong, and there is not a single iota of my being that doubts that. (I don't know, Katy, maybe this is a Wisconsin thing 😂)
This resonates with me in so many ways and I completely agree with the fantasy challenge, dystopian worlds are much easier for me to wrap my head around.
I was born in Los Angeles and lived in and around that area until I was 11 when we moved to southern New Mexico. I lived there from 5th grade through high school and stayed for college when my family moved to Parker, CO (though I don’t identify with that location) and then lived in northern New Mexico to teach for two years. Following that I lived in Philadelphia for a summer then moved to Tulsa, Oklahoma for a few years then Oklahoma City a few more years and finally moved to Burlington, Vermont in 2020 with no plans to leave! 😂 I’ve spent about a decade in every time one making my way east, so it’s kinda fun in that respect.
Hmm... interesting! I do enjoy books with a strong sense of place. Kerry Winfrey sets many of her stories in Columbus, OH (where I've always lived and isn't a frequent setting, I find) and I think it's so fun! Something I love most about her stories is the familiar setting. I've never deeply thought about the influence of place upon other types of writing, though it's undoubtedly a factor. Something to think about!
This reminded me of the book I read–a finished copy–which was set in rural Wisconsin. The characters referenced "tollways" several times, as in getting on and off the tollway. It took me out of the book so fast and made me so angry that the copyeditor couldn't be bothered to see if Wisconsin even had tollways.
Thanks Katy for sharing this! Place and what it means is so interesting. I’m familiar with a few of your places. I’m a fellow Wisconsinite. My dad’s family is from the Spring Green driftless area—it’s a beautiful area! And my husband and I had our first two kids while living in Arlington Heights, IL. They have the best library! I had breakfast with my mom last week at the Egg Harbor Cafe in Arlington Hts. She still lives in nearby Des Plaines where I grew up and still think of home.
Like you, my husband has strong place identity and loves the outdoors. He grew up in Harvard (which is almost Wisconsin). I prefer more urban and don’t like the cold here. But I’d never move for the weather because like they say, six months later I’d find something else to bitch about. We plan on staying put until our youngest graduates high school in ten years. And then if we move, it’ll be for family reasons.
What an interesting post. Sense of place and a strong setting are really important to me, too. What you said about struggling to read fantasy struck a chord. I've never thought of it that way before!
Love the idea of this post, I also love when a book has a strong sense of place! And I'm located in Barcelona, Spain, never moved from here though! Cheers 💛
I love this concept of sense of place. I'm originally from outside Inverness in the Scottish Highlands and although I left to go to University when I was 18 and have never lived there permanently since, it's still where I regard myself as being "From". I now live in Edinburgh and have lived here longer than anywhere else in my life. I love it but I am still from the Highlands.
I also really resonate with books which convey a string sense of place, particularly if that is a rural place!
I love the photo of the dogs on the lane. :).
This was a great idea for a post - I'd never heard of the Driftless Region or why it's called that, so thanks for that. I grew up in a town next to Arlington Heights! I've lived in IL and CO and man, CO real estate is bonkers. I wouldn't go back for that reason, and others. We are back in a small IL town where the movie Groundhog Day was filmed, with a cobblestone square and an opera house, and we love it here.
As for fantasy and sci fi, that's part of why I love reading it--it's similar but different. I can read about hard things in a fantasy setting but can't read war novels. The cruelty cuts too close.
I am so similar! I have never lived in a city either and definitely identify best with small town life in books like my hometown, which was just 3000 people and honestly pretty idyllic. Now I'm in an adorable seaside town of around 12,000 that my stepdad sometimes refers to as "Pleasantville" and honestly he's not wrong. I also love a feeling of place in books and definitely gravitate most to books that involve the outdoors. I also cannot get into most fantasy books and maybe your reasoning is why! I will have to think more on that. :)
I love this! A strong sense of place always bumps up a book a notch in my estimation. I grew up in San Francisco, lived in Boston for a while, and now live in New York City. I was never super attached to Boston while I was living there but I read a romance theoretically set there last year and there was zero sense of place and I was weirdly ready to defend the city's honor?
This is fascinating! While I do connect more if a book takes place somewhere I've been, I don't mind books that have made up fictional places, especially if the author takes great care to make a whole community and it seems like it actually exists. Like you I struggle with fantasy worlds because they aren't built on actual places (plus all the names is just too much for me I need more realism). I always enjoy hearing where people grew up. I'm from a small college town and we moved once when I was in HS from one end of town to the other, a whole 1.5 miles. And then when I moved out after college until now (about 22 years) I've lived in 11 different homes. So moving around a lot as an adult has been weird when I was in the same place my whole childhood (I've lived in only 2 different states, but 5 cities). My fave is my parents who spent their entire lives in the same small town/area and in retirement moved to the St. Louis area. Most people don't do that in retirement, but that's where all the grandkids are.
I have long told my husband, who is from a small town on the border of Indiana and Kentucky, that I will do whatever he wants with his body when he is dead, but I need my remains to stay in Wisconsin with or without him, no matter what. I have been lucky enough to travel all around the world but this is the place I come from and it's the place I belong, and there is not a single iota of my being that doubts that. (I don't know, Katy, maybe this is a Wisconsin thing 😂)
This resonates with me in so many ways and I completely agree with the fantasy challenge, dystopian worlds are much easier for me to wrap my head around.
I was born in Los Angeles and lived in and around that area until I was 11 when we moved to southern New Mexico. I lived there from 5th grade through high school and stayed for college when my family moved to Parker, CO (though I don’t identify with that location) and then lived in northern New Mexico to teach for two years. Following that I lived in Philadelphia for a summer then moved to Tulsa, Oklahoma for a few years then Oklahoma City a few more years and finally moved to Burlington, Vermont in 2020 with no plans to leave! 😂 I’ve spent about a decade in every time one making my way east, so it’s kinda fun in that respect.
Hmm... interesting! I do enjoy books with a strong sense of place. Kerry Winfrey sets many of her stories in Columbus, OH (where I've always lived and isn't a frequent setting, I find) and I think it's so fun! Something I love most about her stories is the familiar setting. I've never deeply thought about the influence of place upon other types of writing, though it's undoubtedly a factor. Something to think about!
This reminded me of the book I read–a finished copy–which was set in rural Wisconsin. The characters referenced "tollways" several times, as in getting on and off the tollway. It took me out of the book so fast and made me so angry that the copyeditor couldn't be bothered to see if Wisconsin even had tollways.
Thanks Katy for sharing this! Place and what it means is so interesting. I’m familiar with a few of your places. I’m a fellow Wisconsinite. My dad’s family is from the Spring Green driftless area—it’s a beautiful area! And my husband and I had our first two kids while living in Arlington Heights, IL. They have the best library! I had breakfast with my mom last week at the Egg Harbor Cafe in Arlington Hts. She still lives in nearby Des Plaines where I grew up and still think of home.
Like you, my husband has strong place identity and loves the outdoors. He grew up in Harvard (which is almost Wisconsin). I prefer more urban and don’t like the cold here. But I’d never move for the weather because like they say, six months later I’d find something else to bitch about. We plan on staying put until our youngest graduates high school in ten years. And then if we move, it’ll be for family reasons.
What an interesting post. Sense of place and a strong setting are really important to me, too. What you said about struggling to read fantasy struck a chord. I've never thought of it that way before!
I loved reading more about your special corner of Wisconsin that I knew nothing about ☺️