The title of this work is a transliteration of the Irish Gaelic word for island: oileán. I figured I could reference both the religious and cultural aspects of the story by including the island itself in a sort of prayer or mantra. "Oil lean mild" wishes someone reckless well, and was originally going to be coined by an island resident as Ciara, on a dare, covers herself in allegedly fire-retardant vegetable oil and approaches an open flame. Ah, what fun that might have been.

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Take a look at this map of the island I pulled from Wikipedia, at Little Bay in the top left and the volcano east of Plymouth. The island has just under 5,000 residents, and had a similar population back in 2004—when the story is set—too. The 'Exclusion Zone' in the bottom two-thirds of the island describes those areas that were deemed inhospitable for people after a series of eruptions taking place at the tail end of the 20th century. Another idea I had on my first draft of 'Oil' was to actually introduce superflora and -fauna (Annihilation-style) as Ciara traversed the zone, but in the interest of groundedness I took the better bits and put them in her nighttime walk in the fourth chapter.