Book Settings: Baby, It's Cold Outside

Don't you love books where the settings are so organic to the story that you feel as if you're there?

Shiver and Read

Winter is particularly fun to read about if you're a January couch potato like me. I don't like cold weather, but I'm not opposed to reading about blizzards and gale-force winds if I'm curled up on the couch and snuggled under a fleecy throw.

That's exactly where I was when I read Prey by Linda Howard. Linda did a great job of making me  shiver in the early winter storm that hit Montana, trapping the feisty heroine and the all-male hero in the great outdoors. Her books are always great entertainment. Linda has another winter-set novel, Ice. I'm looking forward to reading it now.

Experienced Enough Snow To Last Forever

Maybe I empathize a little more than usual with characters in the cold because I went through a blizzard in the Dakotas many years ago. Trapped inside for 3 days with no electricity when it snowing horizontally outside is not my idea of fun. I turned that experience into a novella published years ago. Now, I'm taking that story and turning it into a full length book.

Books Recs

Want another icy setting in a book? Try The Terror by Dan Simmons. Others that might tickle your winter fancy are anything set in Russia from Dr. Zhivago to Gorky Park to One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich, although that one is almost too frigid to stay warm while reading.

Takeaway Truth

Summer heat or winter cold, what setting do you like?