Reality in Fiction

Successful fiction is built on reality. Not just the plot and the characters, but the setting must be based in reality, too.

The setting could be very like a character in the story, as a haunted house might be or a hurricane-lashed shore or a snow-bound mountain pass. In which case, a writer must be as meticulous in making it a complete vision as they would be with any major character.

Even if this setting is just a setting, it still must be believable. Descriptions and references to the real world need not be numerous or extensive. Real world minutiae will stimulate the reader to fill in the rest of the setting. 

Not every reader will be an expert in all fields, but each reader will be an expert in their own lives and worlds so a writer must be accurate in their small bits of reality. We don't want to do anything to throw the reader out of the story.

It doesn't matter what our setting is. Conformity to the real world is the place to begin. Then we can add the touches that will make our setting fit somewhere in the past or far into the future. In deepest, darkest Africa or the sunny splendor of the Caribbean. 

An easy method of research to write believable fiction is to pay attention to our world. It's a good habit to cultivate.

Yesterday, I took my car in for an oil change. 

This is the view from the parking lot of the oil and lube place. That white area at the top of the hills just left of center is actually Pike's Peak, seventy miles to the south. We can see it from my front porch, too. When I look at it, I focus on it and it is much larger in my view than it is in this photo. When I am LOOKING at it, I naturally crop all the things I'm not interested in and zoom in on, in this case, the snow covered mountain top.

Photos of the moon work the same way. A rising full moon looks huge, but try to get a photo giving the moon the same prominence without zooming in on it. You can't.

And that's the way we must bring a reader into the setting. Zoom in on the visual element that will put them firmly into the setting.

While my car was being serviced, I walked the half mile or so down to my house, paying particular attention to things around me.
                    

Spring has finally arrived here at the base of the Rocky Mountains and the lilacs are in bloom. During my walk I passed both white and purple forms of lilacs. Guess what. The white lilacs in the left photo have no scent, while the purple ones in the right photo do. Almost to the point of being overwhelming.

Lilacs remind me: if I put plants in my scene, I must be sure to have the right plants. Lilacs and apples, don't do well in Southeast Arkansas. It doesn't get cold enough for them there. Honeysuckle does do well there and fills the air with it's own perfume. It does not do well here.

             

                         Columbine                                                       Irises

In May, the daffodils are gone. They bloomed a month before the last snows. And the tulips are past their prime. Columbine and Irises bloom in early summer. Roses are showing new growth and putting on leaves. Lawn mower tracks sweep back and forth over luxuriant grass.

These plants give the impression that the neighborhood is well-kept and the people are concerned with how it looks. They have enough leisure time to spend on lawn care or enough money to hire it done.

It doesn't matter what our neighborhood is really like. We can use real things about it to portray it in any light we like.

               

                                Dandelion                                      tiny purple Stork's Bill, leaf litter,
                                                                                         and plants run amok

In addition to the tony, well-cared-for lawns on my walk, there were Dandelions growing unfettered in cracks and along the edges of the sidewalk. Tiny, purple Stork's Bill, identified by the local Extension Service as weeds have taken over a yard here and there. (Actually, I rather like both flowers.)

Because they are generally regarded as weeds, these plants give the impression that this neighborhood is less well-off, a bit rundown, lower class perhaps.

By the mere mention of what's growing in the neighborhood, we can focus our readers' views and set the tone of the scene.

"Sorry I'm in the way, will move soon."

A house shrouded in tarps, stacks of new building materials extending onto the sidewalk, the sharp popping sounds of nail guns, people talking as they work. All signs pointing to a remodel of the house, a positive tone. Here is a home being restored or improved.

If the building materials appear to be weathered and there are no workmen on site, the sense of the scene is very different.

(In reality, this house is being remodeled. I love that the workmen apologized for their materials blocking part of the sidewalk. And only a small part of the sidewalk at that.)

Take a walk in your neighborhood and see how you see it. And how it smells. What can you hear?How does the air feel? What effort does the terrain require of you? How does the light change as you go? What else can you use to make a setting seem real?

Maybe the best thing about my walk yesterday was that my husband gave me a ride back up the hill to get my car when it was done.

Using Real World Senses

Green Mountain December 18, 2015

A writer needs to involve all the senses to set a scene or build a character. A good way to prepare to do this is to just pay attention to your own senses in the real world.

I walk in my neighborhood and gather ample sensory fodder to use.

First the sense of sight. In the distance, Green Mountain is obviously white, but the blue sky over Green Mountain tells me this snow is past. And the view is clear -- no blowing snow to dim the view, no shadows identifying the nooks and crannies of the mountain so the sun must still be in the east or overhead.

And touch. If you could've seen me, you'd know that I was wearing a t-shirt. No coat. No gloves. No hat. When I touched the snow, it was cold enough to make my hands ache. And wet enough to hold the snow ball shape. Yet all the while, the Colorado sun is warm against my skin, regardless of the ambient temperature. Warm enough to be perfectly comfortable. And there is no wind, not even a light breeze, and the lack of moving air touching my face is as palpable as a 20 mph gust, if I'm paying attention.

I'm surrounded by sound. Children squeal with delight and call back and forth to each other as they sled down a nearby hill. A tree full of magpies sound off. Their raucous cries punctuated with the piping of chickadees and counted by the coo of a dove. Somewhere a dog barks. And I can barely hear the traffic noises from the distant interstate highway. Barely, but it's there. The melting snow sounds of running water, while it crunches under foot in areas where it refroze in the night.

But scent, that's the one that I think is most important and least described in most written material. It may not be obvious enough to grab our attention, but it's there. Sometimes soft, calming, like a newly bathed and powdered baby. Sometimes energizing like the air in my neighborhood. Clear and cold and smelling of winter.

Then as I walk, I smell someone's dryer exhaust redolent with the scent of their fabric softener sheet.
And it occurs to me that the smell of clean is different from one person to the next. That can tell a lot about a character. To one character, that dryer sheet smells clean. To another the smell of sun-dried laundry means clean.

And scent from a house where they've had bacon for breakfast stimulates my sense of taste and makes me hungry and ready to go home.

My husband adds a sixth sense, proprioception. That's the sense of the relative position of parts of the body and the effort being employed in movement. This sense is probably more developed in my dancer and athlete brothers and sisters than it is in me. But I'm learning.

Take away one of these senses from our character or our scene and I've got a disabled character or a diminished scene. Or a really good plot device.