How difficult do you find it to write about spring when there is snow on the ground? Or the festive hustle-bustle of the Christmas holiday when you’re planning a beach party? As a writer, it’s easy to dip into our imagination and resurrect a setting on which to draw, no matter the time of year. I don’t need to sit poolside with the sun on my face and the scent of chlorine in the air to write about a summer swim. Most of the time it isn’t plausible to have our fictional seasons coincide with reality. If you’re like me, you probably start writing during one season and wrap your book in another.

Case in point—I remember writing Eclipse Lake, a book set at a summer resort, to the symphony of a winter wind howling outside. Daytime temperatures didn’t climb above the low 30s and the sky was a…