Everyday Canvas

Settings as to Place

Prompt: In your writing, do you use real-life settings (as to place) or made-up settings? What are the positives or negatives of each choice?

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I do different things with settings. Sometimes a setting, whether it is from real life or made-up, becomes a character for me. If so, I have to be really attentive to it because a character puts a heavier responsibility on the shoulders of the writer.

Most of the time, I place my story in a made-up town in a known state or country or a neighborhood in a crowded city. Also, the era/time of the place, especially if a real one, has something to do with its usage. I can’t have a victim call a friend or the police on his cell-phone during the sixties and seventies, for example. We had no cell phones then here in the USA, and if anyone had something similar to it, they probably were with the CIA or they paid millions for one.

For me, setting as to place is something to consider seriously. for that reason, I always draw or use a map. Real-life settings are instantly recognizable and can draw the reader in immediately; therefore, even when writing fiction, I have to be perfectly correct. I can’t put a bookstore or a mall where a park stands, for example.

Real life settings are recognizable by name and can make the readers conjure up certain associations with the place. For this reason, I sometimes use the name of a state but put in it an imaginary town.

Made-up settings, on the other hand, let me off the hook from using the real facts. I can, in fact, alter the entire reality of the place and I may even place my story on another planet or galaxy. If so, I usually draw a map even with more detail because the reader's attention to detail becomes even more precise.

What makes a story, in my opinion, is not the place or the setting but the characters and the plot. Still, the setting is usually the frame the picture is shown in, and we know how important frames are to any work of art.