Setting is vital, so it doesn't seem your characters are existing in a vacuum. But this is an area where less is more. A well-chosen sentence or two that describe a few important details is better than a page full of unimportant details. Your reader needs to "see" the setting in his/her mind, but they don't want a listing of every pencil and dust bunny in the room. They prefer to put their own spin on it.
Today's Tarot deck is the Paulina Tarot. Here are a couple of sample images from the deck:
Images courtesy of Aeclectic Tarot
I asked the Tarot what setting would work best for the story I'm working on. The card I drew was the Six of Wands. It shows a boy riding what looks like a dragon, while penguins watch from the ground. Yet it's clearly not the region where you'd find penguins. I'm going to interpret this as meaning my setting should be incongruous...somewhere you wouldn't ordinarily expect the story to take place. For instance, a rodeo in New Jersey. Or it could be a setting that doesn't mesh with the main character, i.e. a surfer in Montana. This will add an extra fun touch to the story and make it a little different than the norm.
2 comments:
You are right that setting is one of the first concerns when writing a story. Unfortunately, I missed adding setting to several scenes in my latest novel and I am now going through the story to ensure that each scene is set somewhere rather than making the reader guess.
Gail’s 2016 April A to Z Challenge
S is for Save Our Planet
I once heard that in order to qualify as a change in scene, one of these three things has to happen: a change in narrator/POV; a change in time; or a change in setting. So setting can be pretty important in all kinds of ways!
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