Writing Notes: Exploring your Setting
(Excerpted from the Young Novelist Workbook)
PART 1: Settings That Create Moods
Mood - the feeling of your novel; its emotional quality.
You can also think of the mood as how you want someone to feel while reading your novel.
Examples: playful, serious, mysterious, tense, warm, dangerous, joyous
The setting of a novel - where and when the story takes place. As you know, most novels have more than one setting.
Usually, the author decides to have one large setting.
Example: Los Angeles in 1995
and then many smaller settings
Examples: The laundromat where the characters hang out on the weekends, or the classroom where they get in a fight
Settings do more than serve as a backdrop to the action in your novel. They can also create or enhance the mood of your novel.
If you wanted to create a creepy mood for a scene in your novel, you could start with something like:
"A dead tree stood alone in a dark field. Its branches creaked in a cold wind, and in the distance, something howled.”
These images remind us of dark, disturbing things, and show the reader that the scene of the novel is “creepy” without having to tell them directly.
Describing the Setting: A Sample Exercise
Describe the settings that would help create each of the moods listed below.
Try to write 2 or 3 sentences for each mood.
Include specific details about the sights, sounds, sensations (and maybe even smells) of the settings you choose:
Creepy, Joyous, Suspenseful/tense
Now make up 2-3 of your own moods and describe a setting that would go along with each one.
The last step is to apply your new skills to your upcoming novel.
Think of a scene from each section of your novel.
Then, write or list details to describe a setting that will help create the right mood for each scene.
Example: You might set your climax on the edge of a crumbling cliff at sunset in the middle of a thunderstorm.
A setting from your set-up:
A setting from your inciting incident:
A setting from your rising action:
A setting from your climax:
A setting from your falling action:
A setting from your resolution:
Now you have settings to enhance the different moods that will be in your novel.
PART 2: Settings That Reinforce Characters
Another advanced writing trick is to show things about your characters just by putting them in specific settings.
Examples: If you were writing about a mysterious person, you might place them in a dark mansion on a hill outside of town; if you were writing about a musician, you might place them in a messy room filled with instruments, speakers, and microphones.
For each of the following characters, try to come up with a setting that will reflect or reinforce what you imagine about them.
As you write, try to be as detailed as possible.
Don’t forget colors, sounds, and even smells.
Focus on where the character is.
A secret scientist superhero:
A character from your novel:
Another character from your novel:
