Hey there!

I’ve spent the past week on a cycle tour of northern England and the Lake District, and the thing that struck me—again and again—was how familiar it all felt.

Not just because I spent a bit of time in the Lakes during a study abroad program in college, but because of how embedded some of these towns and landscapes are in literary culture.

As we walked along Hadrian’s Wall, I couldn’t help but think of Game of Thrones and the Ice Wall protecting known civilization from unknown wintry devastation.

As we hiked and biked around the Lake District, snippets of poetry from Wordsworth and Coleridge were literally inscribed in the stones around us—romantic lines inviting us to slow down and appreciate the gorgeous natural landscape.

At the same time, the area was used as a filming location for Star Wars: The Force Awakens. As we hiked up the ridge of the Catbells, it was easy to visualize the Millennium Falcon swooping low over Derwentwater.

Later, we wandered the streets of York—which are a palimpsest of medieval and modern architecture. It feels like you’re entering a fairy tail even while you’re walking past a Marks & Spencer department store. Step into the Shambles and you can’t help but think about Diagon Alley in the Harry Potter books (partly because so many shops capitalize on the fact that the Shambles was used as a filming location for the movies).

And that’s just scratching the surface.

One of my favorite things about travel is immersing myself in stories that are both familiar and new to me. Those stories are the best souvenirs, because they don’t just sit on a shelf collecting dust—they become threads of connection that tie us to each other, all around the globe.

And one of my favorite things about this newsletter is that I have readers from everywhere.

I’m endlessly fascinated by the ways extremely specific locations show up in popular culture.

So I’d love to hear from you.

Where are you in the world? Which of your local stories and landscapes have made a larger impression in the literary world?

Hit reply and let me know! I’ll feature people’s responses in my next newsletter.

Happy reading!

Jessie

More For Your TBR

I’m continuing to partner with other thriller writers to share books with our audiences, and I’ve got some interesting ones for you today! I think you might like them. And bonus: they're free!

As always, I’d love to hear your take on the books I share to help me tailor what I search out for you folks. :)

Take Three by Manon Jean A NIGHT OF FUN & A LIFETIME OF CONSEQUENCES! What was meant to be a night of fun turns into a waking nightmare when three young women are abducted from a nightclub. Their only way out? A desperate fight against a fate that seems impossible to escape. For the missing Black girls, life is a tangled web of secrets, ambition, and survival! Get My Copy!

The Lattice Scheme by A. L. Lieske Azure Prescott, a low-level agent with quiet ambitions, suddenly finds herself at the forefront of a classified experiment: sanctioned access to enter and interrogate through the dreams of others. Her first assignment thrusts her into an international operation, unraveling the disappearance of an Italian intelligence agent and the secrets he was chasing. Soon, her path collides with a charismatic External detective, leading her into an unsanctioned inquiry that touches her own mentor and a buried, ignominious record. Undercover marriages, criminal networks, illicit neurotechnology, and revenants from the past all begin to converge, turning each recovered memory into a fragment of a far greater deception. As investigations spiral beyond control, Azure must navigate a web of conspiracy that stretches across borders and consciousness itself, threatening not only the intelligence system she serves but the very stability of identity and reality. Get My Copy!

Happy reading,

Jessie