Three or Four Families in a Country Village

A niece of mine is writing a novel and has been sending me chapters, which is the most agreeable post I receive.

My advice to her is what I would give anyone: three or four families in a country village is the very thing to work on. Do not send your people to places you have never seen, for you will describe them wrongly and your readers will know it.

Keep to what you understand, and look at it closely. A little bit of ivory, two inches wide, can hold a whole world if it is worked with a fine enough brush.