Fires by Rick Bass, 2013
The magic trick:
Recognizing the importance of setting (especially to the readers enjoying the escape to this not-familiar-to-them terrain) and describing it well
I guess every writer assesses the general familiarity of their setting every time they sit down to write anything. You have to determine how many words you need to devote to description. If your setting is a standard city street, maybe not so much description is necessary. If it’s the wild of the American west, you may assume not many of your readers will be able to picture it without your help.
That’s the case here with “Fires,” and Bass is up to the challenge, giving us beautiful descriptions of the rugged scenery.
One suspects, he also knows that these descriptions are not only functional for a reading audience that isn’t familiar with the landscape, they are part of what makes his subject matter special. He certainly leans into the opportunity to bring the natural environment of the American west to life on the page.
And that’s quite a trick on Bass’s part.
The selection:
The snowline has moved up out of the valley by April, up into the woods, and even on up above the woods, disappearing except for the smallest remote oval patches of it, and the snowshoe hares, gaunt but still white, move down out of the snow as it retreats to get to the gardens’ fresh berries, and the green growing grasses; but you can see the rabbits coming a mile away, coming after your berries — hopping through the green and gold sun-filled woods, as white and pure as Persian cats, hoppin’ over brown logs, coming down from the centuries-old game trails of black earth.
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