A brief look at the settings in Beckoning Blood

Beckoning Blood takes place in three main locations, from the romantic locations of Carcassonne and a forest in Saxony, Germany, to the perhaps odd choice of Perth, Western Australia.

Carcassonne is a very old fortified town in the south of France. The site has been occupied since the sixth century AD, starting with Romans, then Visigoths, before it settled into its long medieval history. It was an impenetrable fortress – for a time. Its high walls and citadel surveyed the Languedoc.

Carcassonne has seen its fair share of battles, even besieged to root out heretical Cathars. Witches have been burned in its squares. Its town burnt to the ground by the English Black Prince. And then, eventually, it was left to rot. It’s place of importance gone when the borders of France shifted.

Quarried for its stone and left to the rats and dogs, it would have faded completely if not for Viollet-le-Duc, a French architect in the 1800s, who rediscovered the empty and crumbling town and restored it. Today it is the second most visited city in France (after Paris).

With all this romanticism going on and with a beautiful fortified citadel to use as a backdrop, here is where my twin vampires, Olivier and Thierry, are born. Here is where they suffer at the hands of their father, where Thierry finds solace in Etienne’s arms, and where Olivier plots a course to deliver him his one true wish.

From Carcassonne it’s only a short jump to the forests of Saxony in Germany. I didn’t choose Saxony exactly, that came later, but I chose Germany because I wanted to continue the romantic theme.

I’m sure you’ve seen photos of the Neuschwanstein Castle before. It’s the one Disney based its fairytale kingdom on. And while I didn’t use that castle exactly as the basis for a setting in my book, I used the idea. A castle surrounded by a forest, an important link to the brothers’ beginnings. (The forest near Carcassonne is very important to the brothers, though for different reasons.)

This ties in with one of the things that springs to mind when I think of Germany, which is the Black Forest. Once again, I didn’t base the forest in the book on the Black Forest but just took the allusion to it and ran with it. Isolation was what mattered for this part of the book.

And then, where do we go? New York? London? Beijing? Not even close. (Well, Beijing isn’t too far.)

I went to Perth. My hometown. Perth has a reputation of being a dull town. Deserved or not, there’s something open about the city with its sprawling suburbia that is in stark contrast to the other locations. To be honest, I think I chose it because I knew it. I’ve been to other cities in the world but I don’t know them like I know Perth.

I didn’t include too many recognisable landmarks in the book (though I know where they are) but I felt comfortable having the brothers navigate its streets. I also like the small town feeling that Perth provided. Olivier and Thierry stand out against its backdrop, providing a nice bit of grotesque horror against the suburban surroundings.

Well, there you have it. The three settings from Beckoning Blood. Have you read the book? Which location did you prefer? And where do you think the brothers should go next?

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