What role does the setting play in "The Weight of Blood"?

The Weight of Blood is set deep in the Ozark Mountains of Missouri. Describing the valley where her family first settled, Lucy tells us, "What was left of the homestead now was a cluster of tin-roofed out-buildings in various states of decomposition, a collapsed barn, a root cellar with its crumbled steps leading into the earth, and the stone foundation and chimneys of the main house. Walnut trees had sprouted in the spaces between the buildings." What role does the setting play in this novel.

I think in some small towns, especially places where generations of families have tended to stay in place, the loyalty to family can become an all encompassing theme. Families can put each other above all else, a type of siege mentality. In a big city or a more transient location it is harder to maintain this bond. Once members of the family leave for work or school they can break the bonds. In this town, few people leave, everyone knows everyone's business. The town is isolated, surrounded by caves, woods, mountains, places to hide and to hide things...

Everything! Like ruthless said above, in small communities the sense of privacy is a whole different game than it is in a larger urban setting. The isolation is its own security.

The setting is as much a character in this story as Carl and Crete. We too often think that big cities present a picture of concealed crimes of depravity, but small isolated back wood towns are just as fertile an area .

The setting of the story is what makes the narrrative believable. In a small, poor town such as Henbane where people aren't worldly or sophisticated and in many instances probably illiterate there is greater chance that a bully and murderer like Crete can flourish. There would be less questioning of his actions.

Only in this kind of settings could this story be believable. Mountain people are very clannish and distrustful of outsiders; everyone knows everything about everybody and usually there is a rich, powerful, ruthless person who is feared by the community

I agree with my fellow readers - it was the depths of the Ozarks, a small and very poor community who depended for many year as its savior so to speak. These people are undereducated, unworldly, and distrustful of outsiders no matter the stories they hear. Set here or in another poverty stricken area of our country this kind of story could and perhaps does happen on a regular basis.

The atmosphere is a character in the story. The isolation and poverty added to the hold some people had over others.

Everything. The Ozark area where the story is set is very wary of "outsiders", and superstion is still very prevalent.

I admit to struggling with the setting of the book. I think, in a lot of ways, the author is depending on our preconceived ideas that the Ozarks are a superstitious backwoods, filled with dark secrets and town bullies. Do we think the isolation that breeds this kind of environment is still alive and well in a generation of cell phone and internet users? I had a difficult time suspending my disbelief.

Having said this, the author used these preconceived ideas very well. The setting is often so dark, decaying and oppressive that it seems to have a life of its own. It's hard to image anyone actually thriving for very long in Henbane.