Creating setting
Is setting that important? Today it isn’t as important as it was way-back-when. Long descriptions will put today’s readers to sleep. However, one does need to create a believable world. The old writers took pages to describe the setting. Today, with less patient readers, we need to nail it in a paragraph or less.
A Sci-Fi writer has a difficult task and, at the same time, a simpler one, creating his/her world than a mystery writer does. He/she can invent weapons, creatures, and forms of transportation his/her way and if he or she can suspend disbelief, no one takes them to task.
Try using a weapon incorrectly in a mystery or suspense book. You’ll have people crawling out from everywhere screaming, “On page such and so, you had the antagonist fire this weapon wrong. You should have….” Get the idea? We have to be careful when we construct and create. Research everything, get the details right.
Give me dialogue anytime. I can write great dialogue. I can write dialogue standing on my head, or with one hand tied behind my back. On the other hand, when it comes to setting, I struggle.
Posted on November 23, 2009, in My blog, Writer, Writing and tagged Author, Bones, books, Books on writing, Bull Terriers, Care giving, Caregiver, Craft of writing, Dead, Disability, Doggoned, Fiction, Murder, Mysteries, Mystery, Novel writing, Writer, Writing. Bookmark the permalink. 4 Comments.
Doggonedmysteries 
Yeah, converting the vision of a house, a barn, a street, a town, even a room in your head into words on a page that won’t bore your reader to tears is one of the toughest parts of writing.
Yep, it’s that boring them to tears part that we have to be sooooo careful about. Don’t want to do it!
Part of the problem is the perception of the writer vs. that of the reader. When I hear the word ‘barn’ (for example) I (born and raised in Pennsylvania) get a different image than someone from Iowa. How do I get the reader in Iowa to ‘see’ the same barn I see?
Not sure you want the reader to see the same barn you see, but rather have them see the bits of the barn that makes sense to the story. It’s always more engaging to allow the reader to finish filling in “barn” for themselves.
The same thing holds true in painting – there needs to be a balance between saying what you want to with paint and letting the viewer connect lines and fill in blanks to their satisfaction. Painting all the details generally makes a boring painting.