I rarely watch TV, but at the time I was in the habit of viewing weekly PBS reruns of Doctor Who..., because it gave me just enough time to do my nails. So, while pondering the setting for my hypothetical historical novel, I happened to see one very old episode of Doctor Who featuring a "companion" of the Doctor's—a young Scottish lad named Jamie MacCrimmon, whom the Doctor had picked up in 1745. This character wore a kilt, which I thought rather fetching, and demonstrated—in this particular episode—a form of pigheaded male gallantry that I've always found endearing: the strong urge on the part of a man to protect a woman, even though he may realize that she's plainly capable of looking after herself.

I was sitting in church the next day, thinking idly about this particular show (no, oddly enough, I don't remember what the sermon was about that day), when I said suddenly to myself, Well, heck. You want to write a book, you need a historical period, and it doesn't matter where or when. The important thing is just to start, somewhere. Okay. Fine. Scotland, eighteenth century.

No, actually, Frazer has nothing to do with Jamie’s last name—owing to the local PBS station cutting off the “Dr. Who” credits in order to run pledge appeals, I didn’t know the actor’s name until some years later, after the first book had been written. I did send a copy to Frazer then, though, thanking him for the kilt.