One a day, plus iron

Fiction has always been hard for me. I can do snark with the best of them and I like nonfiction because I know where I stand with that. But fiction… fiction is a whitewater river whose pools of detailed description and rocks of excessive handholding conspire to bury the kayak of my narrative, swirling it round and round under the smooth surface of the pool until the narrative gasps helplessly for air in
obedience to a compulsion stronger than the conscious mind and dies with a lungful of river water. Fiction is not my friend. Take, for example, a manor house library in regency-era Kent. In November, at the close of day. Tall windows along one side, to let in the light, yes. But you have other things to consider.

( Things? What things? )