Fiona Stone
asked
Francesca Haig:
I am reading the cookbook of common prayer and am puzzled and intrigued by the place of death. Why Buckinghamshire? there are plenty of caves and underground rivers that flash flood, but not in Buckinghamshire. The only ‘caves’ are the man made “Hellfire” caves, spectacular in their construction and use but hard to drown in and no good for caving/ potholing or spelunking.
Francesca Haig
Hi Fiona - and thanks for reading The Cookbook of Common Prayer. I chose Buckinghamshire partly because it doesn't contain any real cave systems - for ethical and legal reasons I didn't want the death in the book to be too close to any of the real caving accidents that sadly have occurred in England. From a plot point of view, I needed somewhere relatively close to London, where a day-excursion from a London school was plausible, and in a region where Gill and Gabe would be able to visit the coroner easily from London. So my priorities were narrative, rather than geological, I'm afraid! If I drew on an existing cave system I would have been limited by the realities of that cave system's layout - inventing one gave me the freedom to create precisely the sequence of events that suited my story. (A related tidbit: the name of my fictional 'Smith-Jackson' cave system is a nod to Dodie Smith and Shirley Jackson, as they are two writers whose control of distinctive narrative voice [in 'I Capture the Castle' and 'We Have Always Lived in the Castle' was an inspiration when I was trying to capture the different voices of each of the narrators). Thanks again for reading, and I hope you enjoyed the novel, despite its geological vagaries!
More Answered Questions
Keri
asked
Francesca Haig:
When will you be coming out with The Fire Sermon sequel? I LOVED The Fire Sermon.
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