PORCUPINE – ”’North American Porcupine”’ (”Erethizon dorsatum”) ”’Photographer:”’ unknown, 1987 ”’Source:”’ Yellowstone Digital Slide File, http://www.nps.gov/yell/slidefile/index.htm ”’Permission:”’ ”These images are in the public domain and may be reproduced, free of charge.
When I was writing Blue John’s Cavern I did a lot of research about the area of Castleton, Derbyshire, England. I tend to write on the fly without much pre-planning so as new ideas and scenes popped into my head I found myself performing some follow-up research. There is a scene in the book where Emma has an unfortunate encounter with a hedgehog. Hedgehog? Really? Yup.
Originally, I wrote that she found herself
facing a porcupine, but when I did a little research I found that…THERE ARE NO PORCUPINES IN ENGLAND!
That’s right. I had no idea that England
HEDGEHOG – Permission is granted to copy, distribute and/or modify this document under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License, Version 1.2 or any later version published by the Free Software Foundation; with no Invariant Sections, no Front-Cover Texts, and no Back-Cover Texts.
has hedgehogs rather than porcupines. They are fairly similar so the scene in the book work just fine with Mr. Hedgehog. But, I was surprised at what a little research can tell you and how it can make your books more authentic.
