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Writer's pictureMark Sanders

Why Winter?

Humanity's least favorite season dominates The Spring of Llanfyllin

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Unlike most other people I know, I love winter. It's always been my favorite season of the year. I relish the cold weather, the heavy clothes, the ice and the snow. I've been to Minnesota in January. I've experienced temperatures (not wind chill, mind you) in Iowa at forty below zero. I survived the Great Ice Storm of 2009 (the worst of my lifetime).


Since I was little, playing in the snow, building snow forts, having snowball fights, sledding and snowboarding have always been highlights of the winter months. With global warming continuing its onslaught on our environment, I regret to think that the days of missing a week of school in favor of cold, slushy sledding and nights filled with fires and hot chocolate may be only a memory in a few years.


I understand why so many people dread the winter, and this is what made the annual deep freeze an ideal setting for The Spring of Llanfyllin. When it snows, and you're really snowed in, the last thing you want to do is go anywhere. It's cold, it's uncomfortable, and when you're traveling, it can be dangerous.


I drew on many experiences driving through winter weather, especially a sleet storm in Iowa, to help describe the desperation that Dylan and Siannon experience as they make their way through their snow-covered nation. The immediate danger comes from the invasion of the Norse, but the present danger is the environment.


Winter turns our familiar homes into hostile, alien environments. Nothing so transforms the world around us than a blanket of ice and snow. Safely snuggled in, it can be a source of peace and tranquility. Lost and alone outside in it, winter can be a terrifying experience.


At my former residence outside the city limits of my town, we lived adjacent to a lake with a hiking trail that went all around the lake. I loved to hike through the deep snowfall, feeling the cold touch my face, reveling in the silence and the absolute solitude of walking alone in the snow.


That was the other element that my snowy setting brought to the novel, that sense of isolation. One chapter in particular in part two of the novel elaborates on this idea, and it is only in the winter that we can imagine our world as a cold, dead, silent place. The season becomes reflective of the despair each of our characters feels in light of the potential consequences of failure and loss.


Finally, the brutal hostility of winter was the ideal setting for war between the peaceful nation of Llanfyllin and the Norse who will give their lives to possess its capital city and ruling castle. The sleet storm that proves to be the turning point before the climax of the novel was drawn directly from the storm of 2009 and the sense of doom it brought to so many of us.


So whether you're like me, a fan of winter, or like so many others, who dream of tropical vacations when the weather turns blue, The Spring of Llanfyllin will touch on those primal emotions and childhood memories. To read for yourself, please go to my Home Page and click on "Buy Now" for either paperback or Kindle ebook. Thanks for reading today!

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