Nancy
asked
Beatrice Colin:
What made you choose the time and setting (1800's, Paris, Eiffel Tower construction) for To Capture What We Cannot Keep and do you have a particular genre that you prefer to write in (historical fiction, romance etc)?
Beatrice Colin
Hi Nancy, thanks for asking the question! You're the first for this page.
I wanted to write about a city I know well but a time that I wasn't all that familiar with. The Eiffel Tower has always struck me as wonderful - you can see it from all over the city and unlike large building such as the Chrysler in NY or the Gherkin in London isn't just a huge office building, but a structure with no apparent purpose than to be looked at and to look from. So I was curious about it and when I looked it up found a great story that I hadn't expected, not only about the tower but about Gustave Eiffel the French engineer whose company built it. I love the late 1880s as they were a time of huge change, in art, design, politics and I really enjoyed researching it (and, of course, making trips to Paris).
Although I have written fiction set in the present I like writing about the past, digging up facts and ideas that I didn't know and exploring areas that I'm interested in. I want to learn something new when I write a book and writing and researching are always a process of discovery that will change my original conception. I do, however, always try to keep everything historically accurate. I know that readers won't know that if a character caught a number 16 tram to Jordanhill in 1886, for example, there really was a tram that went on that route but I want to make it as plausible as possible with my fictional character walking ghost-like through the past rubbing shoulders with real people. They didn't exist but they could have done. . .
Although they live in other times and other places, my characters are concerned with the same things that concern us all; love, sex, money, family and trying to make the right choices. In the past, however, some of it was so much more complicated and that's where the drama comes from.
Hope this answers your questions. Best wishes,
Bea
I wanted to write about a city I know well but a time that I wasn't all that familiar with. The Eiffel Tower has always struck me as wonderful - you can see it from all over the city and unlike large building such as the Chrysler in NY or the Gherkin in London isn't just a huge office building, but a structure with no apparent purpose than to be looked at and to look from. So I was curious about it and when I looked it up found a great story that I hadn't expected, not only about the tower but about Gustave Eiffel the French engineer whose company built it. I love the late 1880s as they were a time of huge change, in art, design, politics and I really enjoyed researching it (and, of course, making trips to Paris).
Although I have written fiction set in the present I like writing about the past, digging up facts and ideas that I didn't know and exploring areas that I'm interested in. I want to learn something new when I write a book and writing and researching are always a process of discovery that will change my original conception. I do, however, always try to keep everything historically accurate. I know that readers won't know that if a character caught a number 16 tram to Jordanhill in 1886, for example, there really was a tram that went on that route but I want to make it as plausible as possible with my fictional character walking ghost-like through the past rubbing shoulders with real people. They didn't exist but they could have done. . .
Although they live in other times and other places, my characters are concerned with the same things that concern us all; love, sex, money, family and trying to make the right choices. In the past, however, some of it was so much more complicated and that's where the drama comes from.
Hope this answers your questions. Best wishes,
Bea
More Answered Questions
Ashton
asked
Beatrice Colin:
Do you plan on writing other books beside To Capture What We Cannot Keep?
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