Setting is where your story happened. The setting description does not need to come in the beginning of the story but it can.
If you choose not have your setting description at the beginning, you may want to start it off with a hook. The experienced writters seem to start their story with a hook; its often advisable to do so as it grabs the attention of the reader straight away.
If you are a beginner to story writing, you may find it easier to start with a story description rather than a hook. Therefore, in this chapter I will mention how to write a story setting or a setting description.
In the next chapter, I will try to discuss how to write a good but simple hook.
What should a setting have?
A setting description answers the question 'WHERE'. But this must be done carefully and cleverly, otherwise the readers will not be interested in the book.
The best setting description is the one that brings the setting alive in the mind of the readers. Therefore, a writer should have 'SHOW-NOT-TELL' in their story, especially the setting. This can be done in the following six ways:
1. SHOW SETTING VIA A NARRATOR'S PERSONAL POV
2. USE TIME-RELATED SPECIFICS
3. USE SETTING TO REFLECT CHARACTERS' NATURES
4. USE THE SENSES TO EVOKE A SENSE OF PLACE -
The author needs to use the 5 senses to show what the narrator sees, hears, smells, tastes, and feels.
E.g. Emma looked over her shoulder and saw some angry military pick-up trucks. (sense-seeing
She could hear the pleading cries of the women and children being dragged and thrown into the vehicles of despair by the soldiers of the eight pointed star. (sense- hear)
She could smell the stench of injustice in the air polluted by the second holocaust. (Sense- smell. This smelling is not an actual smelling, its a metaphorical smelling. The narrator didn't really smell the injustice because that's not possible; what she did smell is perhaps the smoke from the pick-up trucks. Using a metaphorical sense is fantastic as it describes very clearly the feeling of the narrator very well, it describes the atmosphere very well, it also builds a clear and broader imagination in the readers' minds.)
5. DESCRIBE SETTING TO DEEPEN MOOD
6. USE SETTING DESCRIPTION TO MAKE READERS ASK 'WHAT HAPPENS NEXT?'
(Stay with me, I have more to write.)
YOU ARE READING
Story writing Ideas and Tips
غير روائيThis is book will contain story starters and ideas. this is to help those people who want to write by dont know what to write about. Well, I can't guarantee that this will help you but you may be inspired by some of what I will have listed. Cover d...
