Some of the greatest influences in my life come from the pages of books. Settings send me on real life travels. Characters inspire or give me permission or make me laugh. Writers motivate me and send me back to my notebook.

I finished Annie Proulx’s The Shipping News again this week. I don’t know how many times I’ve read this. I’ve blogged about it multiple times. This time was just as good as all the others. Like any good book, I got something different out of it than in other readings. My first read, I was probably struck by the setting. I’d never read anything set in Newfoundland. I loved how immersive it was, both the landscape and the descriptions of the characters.

On the horizon icebergs like white prisons. The immense blue fabric of the sea, rumpled and creased.

Weather coming on. I see the spiders is lively all day and my knees is full of crackles.

Other readings, I’m sure the sense of place brought me back to the book — it’s a great winter read — but once I was in it, I appreciated the evocative language in one read.

Jack had things on his mind and talked like a rivet gun.

The humor in another.

“You’re a rotten, bitey shit!” bawled Sunshine.

The wisdom in another.

Of course you can do the job. We face up to awful things because we can’t go around them, or forget them.

In this read, what struck me was the main character, Quoyle’s, transformation. His whole life, he was unloved and outcast, a hulking freak. But didn’t want to be.

For Quoyle was a failure at loneliness, yearned to be gregarious, to know his company was a pleasure to others.

When he went north after his demon lover’s death, north to Newfoundland where his terrible ancestors were from, he found his talents. He found community who did not judge him. He found felt a sense of rightness. He found his place in the world.

Thirty-six years old and this was the first time anybody had ever said he’d done it right.

My husband and I are entering a new stage of our lives as both kids move through college. They will start their own adult lives soon, and Brian and I are thinking where we might want to end up one day. Blacksburg was an amazing place to raise our family, but neither of us feel that sense of rightness here.

On a team call once, the icebreaker was “If you could live anywhere in the world, where would you live?” One person looked confused and said, “Uh, where I live now. I can live anywhere in the world, so I moved to where I want to live.”

This was revelatory to me. Lately I’ve hung out with several people who feel this way about their home region. They’re proud of where they live. They have roots and community and that sense of rightness. And for the first time in however many readings of The Shipping News, I see this for Quoyle, too, and I love it for him.

Quoyle experienced moments in all colors, uttered brilliancies, paid attention to the rich sound of waves counting stones, he laughed and wept, noticed sunsets, heard music in rain…

I’m thinking differently now about where I might want to go next. I want it to feel like home.