The Importance of Novel Settings

Setting is always an important element of fiction. Marlys Millhiser chooses settings before her characters. She once said that she spotted an old Victorian house and thought it needed a ghost, so she wrote a novel about it. Phyllis Whitney also planned her novels around a setting. She wanted a place that gave her fresh and interesting material, although it may have been in her own backyard. For her first mystery novel, Red is for Murder, she went to Chicago’s loop to get behind-the-scenes background on the window decorating business. But, because the book only sold 3,000 copies, she returned to writing for children. Years later, the book was reprinted in a number of paperback editions as The Red Carnelian.

For my own first mystery novel, A Village Shattered, I decided to set my story of a serial killer’s revenge in a San Joaquin Valley retirement village where retirees were dropping dead in the Tule fog. I lived in the valley for more than a dozen years and thought it was a great place to hide a murderer, although an unlikely place for a retirement village. However, I’ve since discovered several.

Diary of Murder, the second novel in my Logan and Cafferty series, is set in Wyoming, where I now reside. The state’s severe winter weather and isolated areas make it fertile ground for mystery novels. Unfortunately, it’s becoming one of the methamphetamine capitals of the nation and that serves as the background for my book.

Murder on the Interstate begins along I-40 in northern Arizona, where my protagonists, Dana Logan and Sarah Cafferty, discover the body of a young woman in her Mercedes convertible. The plot takes them to the Phoenix-Scottsdale area and the Pima-Maricopa Indian Reservation, where a chemical spill contaminates the Arizona Canal as far west as Sun City. I set the novel in Arizona because of the state’s problems with illegal emigrants, murders, home invasions, kidnappings and the ever present drug problem. Again, fertile ground for mystery/suspense novels.

I write about areas where I’ve lived or visited and later Google them to ensure accuracy although I may be familiar with the setting. I’m currently working on an historical mystery based on an actual event, which took place here in Wyoming in 1889. I’ve visited the area often and have taken copious pictures, but will return again before I write the conclusion. It’s a breathtaking setting not far from Independence Rock, where hundreds of thousands of travelers stopped to carve their names along the Oregon Trail. A great many of them died along the way, which lends the area an eerie feeling—at least for me. I hope I’ll be able to convey that feeling to my readers.

In some novels, settings hold an equal footing with characters and subject matter. What would Hemingway’s Old Man have done without the Sea? Or Sherlock Holmes without Baker Street? A mystery set in a New York tenement has an entirely different tone than one set in a Beverly Hills mansion. So, when plotting a novel, consider where best to place your protagonist in order to produce maximum mystery, emotion, conflict and suspense.

Novel Settings by Marilyn Meredith

Welcome to the mountain, Marilyn, on this last day of our "Mystery We Write" Holiday tour. It's been a lot of fun and it's great to have you here. Please tell us why novel settings are so  important.

I judge a lot of writing contests and read many books by new writers they’ve self-published and I often see the same problem—a lack of setting. It’s very disconcerting to read about two or three people having a conversation or doing something in an unmentioned location. I want to know where people are while they’re talking. Are they in a kitchen? If so whose kitchen and what does it look like? What does it smell like? So much can be added to what’s going on by including the setting.

Setting is important. Readers like to learn about new places whether they are real or fictional. If you’re going to use a real place be sure you are accurate when describing places and how to get there. If you aren’t, someone will let you know about your errors.

If you make up a place, be sure to keep track of where you put things, the names of the places, and the geography. If it’s in a certain place in a particular state, be sure to have trees and flowers and geographical details that are true to that area.

What’s in the location and setting can add another dimension to your story. Think about the obstacles your character will face because to what’s around him or her.

Don’t forget weather. Weather can add to the tension and the atmosphere of the story. Decide on the time of year for your tale and what weather goes along with it in the area you’ve placed your characters.

Smells can add a lot too. Take a deep breath every time you enter someone’s home. What does it smell like? What about when you’re in the city? Or the country? You are always surrounded by smells, use them in your writing.

And when is your story taking place? Is it a period piece? If so, be sure to be accurate about the technology that is or isn’t available, what is going on politically and historically, what kind of clothes people wear and foods they eat.

If it’s present day, let the reader know right away. Have your characters use the technology that everyone uses today—unless of course, one of them absolutely hates cell phones, or won’t touch a computer as one of his character traits.

My Deputy Tempe Crabtree series is set in the Southern Sierra of California. The town of Bear Creek has a definite resemblance to the town I live in though I’ve moved it a 1000 feet higher in the mountains—giving the area better trees and the possibility of more snow in winter. Another reason I wanted to change the name of the town was because businesses change too often in my town. By the time a book came out where I named a particular restaurant it might be closed.

Nearby is the Bear Creek Indian Reservation which is quite similar to the Tule River Indian Reservation that is close to where I live. In Bears Are Us, Tempe doesn’t have a reason to visit the reservation though she does in several of the other books in the series. I do use some of the Tule River Indian’s legends in my books.

Obviously, there are bears in Bears Are Us. We have an occasionally bear visit in the lower elevations—but having Bear Creek be higher makes if more plausible that bears would become a nuisance and in some cases a threat.

Deputy Tempe Crabtree has her hands full when bears turn up in and around Bear Creek, a young teen commits suicide and his parents’ actions are suspicious, a prominent woman files a complaint against Tempe and her preacher husband Hutch, a love affair from long ago comes to light, and a woman suffering from dementia disappears.

http://mundania.com/book.php?title=Bears+With+Us/

Marilyn Meredith is the author of over thirty published novels, including the award winning Deputy Tempe Crabtree mystery series, the latest Bears With Us from Mundania Press. Writing as F. M. Meredith, her latest Rocky Bluff P.D. crime novel is Angel Lost, the third from Oak Tree Press. Marilyn is a member of EPIC, Four chapters of Sisters in Crime, including the Central Coast chapter, Mystery Writers of America, and on the board of the Public Safety Writers of America. Visit her at http://fictionforyou.com and her blog at http://marilymeredith.blogspot.com/