Mia Darien - New England Writer

My guest blogger today is Mia Darien, writing on the influence of place in her work. She is the author of a paranormal suspense series and also historical romance. Her blog is titled From Mia's desk, where she is graciously hosting an interview with me today, and her latest release is Deeper than Skin, available at Amazon, Smashwords and Barnes & Noble. 

I live at the end of a long dirt road, which stops being an actual road just after my house and turns into a path suitable for hiking, horseback riding and dirt bikes.

Once upon a time, back in the 1700s, it was the main thruway for my town to the town next to us. In the way certain trees appear in swamps, when they aren't normally supposed to, and from the remnants of old stone walls, I know that it used to be pasture land a couple of hundred years ago.

From my back porch, forest stretches out in two directions and my neighbor's horse pasture in another. It's quiet, muddy in the spring, and crystalline in the snow.

I love living in New England.

The first line of my author biography says it best of all: I was born in New England, in the land of snow and fast-talkers, and I've learned that I'm a house plant. I've grown roots very deep here and even if I ever did move, New England will always live in me as much as I live in it now.

It's not perfect, and it's not for everyone. It takes a very particular kind of person to live here, but I was born here and I love it. Well, I hate snow -- I know, right? -- but I love New England.

History is alive everywhere. This is an old place, present day towns reaching back into the 1600s. My own town was founded in 1700 and celebrated its tercentennial just ten years ago. Other cultures stretch back even further. Many a story and myth comes from here, including some of my favorites about tricking the devil with the sole of one's shoe.

Salem is only two hours from me, and few places can so quickly conjure the rich (and tragic) historical images as quickly as that one.

I chose to set my city of Adelheid in Connecticut because I live here, but also because it just seems made for the paranormal. My corner of the state is rural, with forests that packs of werewolves could run through, and history so old that any vampire would feel at home.

You can drive to the coast and see the beach, or inland for rich hills and farmland, without ever having to drive too far. (CT is a small state.) But it offers diversity and beauty and stories. Why wouldn't a storyteller want to live here and be inspired by this place?

Besides, what else are you going to do when you're snowed in but write?

All That Survives

You're walking in the woods and the trail comes to a crossing. Up in the distance, through the trees, lie the assembled headstones of an ancient graveyard. The old stone walls are crumbling, and half the markers are toppled over in the snow, neglected through the years. Some, the veterans of the Revolution, still have flags renewed by dedicated loyalists living in the towns around here. This is the legacy of a not-quite forgotten New England, when bands of families cleared land and struggled to subsist in the granite wilderness, under the constant threat of disease, hunger and Indian attack from Quebec. The headstones have names, Susan Puttnam, her husband Joseph, daughter Evelyn. So many children died young, the little markers washed clean of their engraved names. Now the farms have disappeared along with the settlers, the forest taken over with a vengeance. What attracts me to the old graves are the stories contained in that little clearing, the families, their children, the light that shines on these lives in the imagination. Somehow I find my optimism renewed contemplating the old cemetery. It's why I like sad songs and movies. They speak of resilience and a shared heart that still beats.