I’d promised my daughter I’d take her to the mall, one of her favorite places. I wonder sometimes if the stork brought me the wrong baby; she and I are so different.
I only intended to buy one or two things for the couple of people I had left on my Christmas list. But then…
It was all so…pretty… in the mall. The lights sparkled, it was cheerful and happy. Everyone was loaded down with bags. The mall played determinedly cheerful Christmas music. My bags multiplied. My daughter told me, “It was the glamour! Deadly glamour.”
It was a setting that meant business. The mall owners had gotten their setting perfect. You felt like spending money at South Park Mall. And the mall owners wouldn’t have it any other way.
Since I’m not a setting fanatic, I’ve always been interested in prêt-à-porter, ready to wear settings.
Anytime I tell my children a fairy tale and the characters go into the woods, there are certain expectations. Nothing good ever happens in the woods in fairy tales. We have witches with houses made of candy, wolves who eat grannies and children, and bears who dislike trespassers.
So that type of thing is fun and easy. Readers have certain expectations regarding dark basements in spooky houses, amusement parks, church sanctuaries, graveyards, etc.
It’s also fun and fairly easy to turn the expectations around.
The happy meadow in Bambi is also the ideal place for hunters to take clear aim at deer, for instance.
You can take your reader’s expectations about a setting and turn them upside down—introduce the element of danger to a safe place. A depressing setting (crack house?) could be the location for a life-changing epiphany for your protagonist.
Maybe the next time we go into the woods, things will be a little different there.
ohhh I love this. I could turn that stereotypical setting into something not expected. Love it, Elizabeth.
-Teresa
I just wrote a post on a not so nice setting, with shopping this close to the holidays. The flip side of the coin for the ideal day you had with your daughter.
It was nice to come here and see a different setting, a happier one.
A perfect example on how different elements change up the storyline.(Hugs)Indigo
Love your post. Now I will be thinking what trouble could lurk in my favorite quite places.
The malls are a dangerous place to go this time of year. They do know how to draw you in. You go in for one thing, come out with ten.
Elizabeth – Thanks for this post. You are absolutely right about setting! Sometimess, it’s as real as a character is. In Agatha Christie’s Hallowe’en Party, a young teenager is murdererd during a Hallowe’en party that’s held at the home of the local “pillar-of-the-community-do-gooder.” When Hercule Poirot visits the house, Ariadne Oliver, who’s with him, says, “It doesn’t look the sort of house there’d be a murder in.” That way of turning expectations about a setting can really add to a plot.
When you hate description as much as I do (mostly writing it, but I tend to skip the flowery sections that wax poetic about a sunrise, etc.), it’s hard to force yourself to keep setting clear but not intrusive.
Bringing in ALL of the senses helps, I think. Gives the reader more to latch onto.
And yes, definitely, you have to add those unexpected twists.
(And I’m still trying to figure out who twin #2 really belongs to.)
I like doing the topsy-turvy thing. A recurring theme is things aren’t always as they appear, so by switching out the expected for the unexpected, it reinforces the theme.
Unexpected settings are one of my favorite bits to play with. Setting is one of those things that can play either an active or a passive role. I’ve gotten into the habit of purposefully selecting my settings for even the most mundane scenes. If I can find a setting that brings me an added edge of suspense or beauty or intrigue, I’m one happy camper!
Great post. I love when the setting appears soothing, then Bam! Well.. still get teary during the Bambi scene, but other than that :)
Good idea – take the expected and turn it into the unsuspected. Makes for a unique twist in a tale.
Marvin D Wilson
ps – love the quip about the stork bringing you the wrong baby – I got one kid like that, lol
I never thought about the woods as being scary but now that you mention it fairy tales have given woods a bad name. Usually my characters love forests and spend quiet time there in-between hostile encounters in cities and towns. i did write one short story, that I was hoping to expand on at some stage – where the forest was the location of a mass genocide.
*A depressing setting (crack house?) could be the location for a life-changing epiphany for your protagonist.*
I love this suggestion! The element of surprise, using the setting tho create atmosphere.
Good stuff!
I’m also mother of a Changling. I am not so much wash-n-wear as second hand, formerly interesting, ‘new-to-me’ but I hear you. My daughter has had a sense of style since she was TWO and has loved shopping since her blasted NANA (not me, oh no-sirry) introduced her to the mall when she was about eight.
And I sense a DELICIOUS mall murder series in the works. It is the PERFECT place for it if you ask me… all those smiles covering tension and covetous yearnings…
LOVE the idea of turning settings on their heads–in fact my homeless man who lives in the woods in CONFLUENCE is heavily built on this ‘danger in the woods’ idea (there also is a ‘spirit’ a few of my characters feel in there… oh yeah… and the woman attacked for a tissue sample…) the first two are ambiguous as to the whole good/bad thing… that’s how I like it… I’ll give you a hint though… at least one of those woods things is GOOD…
Oh, Elizabeth, you went into the woods and the bears and witches got you, confiscated your credit cards and loaded your back down with gilded gifts, then sent you on to the next candy house.
I guess I was lucky with my daughter. She hated going to the mall more than I did.
Helen
Straight From Hel
I spent many holidays working retail during the holidays during my college years and did you know, the biggest mall store (it rhymes with my name) actually has a smell funneled into their air ducts? So they trick all the senses when you’re shopping! You’d think it was all from the perfume counter, but it’s not!
Another great topic, Elizabeth. I like turning things upside down!
Teresa–Have fun with it!
Indigo–I could definitely see that side of things in the mall. I usually think of the mall as a more sinister place…definitely not a place I want to spend my day! Except, of course, when my daughter’s with me. :)
Mason–They do! They suck us right in…
Margot–Oh, I remember that! That was a great book.
Marvin–I think there’s got to be one in every household. My son is an oddity, too–an extrovert.
Terry –Those are my thoughts on setting, too. So I like playing my little tricks to make things easier for me (and not so boring.)
A changeling twin! Gotta love it!
Carol–I love surprises and reminders that we can’t take things at face value.
K.M.–I don’t enjoy writing settings, so if I’m pointing a finger to the setting then something unexpected is about to happen.
Jemi–Bambi just killed me when I was a kid. But my children seemed not at all affected at Bambi’s mother’s death. Hmm…
Corra–Or a really happy one for a tragedy? I just love the idea! But then, I had a murder in a church sanctuary for my last release.
Cassandra–In fantasies, they’re frequently refuges, aren’t they? I loved the woods in Narnia. But some wicked things happened there, too.
Hart–Where do these girls come from? Your daughter was probably hooked at the sight of the first escalator. Darned Nanas!
The mall as the Wasteland! And a murder smack dab in the middle of it…right by the cosmetics counters and all the Glamazons. That’s the ticket!
I’m going to love “Confluence!” Homeless men in the woods? Tissue samples? Attacks? Good and evil in the woods? Bring it on!
Helen–They did! They got me. I have major plans, though, on getting them back. I think Hart’s right…there’s going to be a murder. :)
What an intriguing suggestion. I always found the confessional booths in church scary places. I’d wait outside while my grandmother went in, and for some reason I worried about her welfare. Not sure why. Perhaps I should write this into a story.
You have yourself a Merry Christmas! From one Elizabeth to another.
Great post! I love and hate malls this time of the year. They’re so gorgeous and fum. My wallet also loves them and they’re so crowded. :)
Elizabeth–Those would be scary places! Dim, secretive. Sounds like a story to me!
Merry Christmas to you, too!
Bethany–Oh, it was definitely crowded. But that kind of makes you feel like *everyone* wants to be there and you’re SO lucky. :)
yes, the moment before the bad news arives. or the moment before the husband walks out the door never to return. or the moment the girl notices that her mother isn’t, hmmm…quite right. eeek. I’m scaring myself. A MALL BEFORE CHRISTMAS! My dad won’t even travel through Bangor because of the scary settings Stephen King has created. But they pale to me compared to a mall before Christmas. Yikes.
Jan–You’re scaring me, too! And I’m about to turn in for the night!
I think you’re right…the mall might be even scarier than Bangor. And definitely more expensive…
Stacy–I’m starting to wonder if maybe they put a drug in the air ducts, too! I might have gone into that store that rhymes with Stacy… :)
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On a totally different note – they were playing Christmas carols in the bookstore the other day. Now, I rarely hear Christmas carols in India any more (for some strange reason, we seem to think George Micheal’s ‘Last Christmas’ is a christmas song), and started humming along.
I was there for nearly half an hour,and bought nothing. I am sure that was not quite what they intended.