Do you feel a realistic setting is very important for horror/fantastic stories?

[Gerald]

A lot of the bestseller-writers like SK spend a lot of attention to the detail of their settings. The point I think is that you get a realistic world (modern America in King's case), which make the fantastic elements more fantastic in contrast, because they happen in such a real and recognisable world.

But would horror in a fantastic setting be less effective? For example is a vampire or monster in modern America, in today's world, scarier than one in, say, Mid-World or some other fantasy land?

I get the feeling that it doesn't matter so much as long as you have characters the reader can care about and put them in peril and know how to describe this peril well.

What I'm wondering is: what do you win by adding so much detail when it's set in the real world? King always mentions all the streets, roads, and highways for example, although to a degree he 'bends' the real world (of Maine for example) to the needs of his writing, it's not exactly the same in reality as he writes it- so basically even though it seems totally realistic and existing it isn't quite.
Lee Child in the interview with King said that even though he uses New York in his novels, it's sort of his own version of it.

Does a book to be succesful for audiences nowadays really need to be so precise in terms of a setting that actually seems very close to real places (even though it often isn't really completely so)? When you look at all the bestseller writers it seems so, because all of them (at least the ones I know) write that way.
Or could an audience also be captured by a book that doesn't spend so much time describing the settings?
And, what do you win by this way of writing? Does it make the book a lot better, scarier, more suspenseful etc.?

 

[doowopgirl]

Just IMO, but, for part of the appeal of SK is the extraordinary happening to ordinary people. So that means the setting has to be ordinary to highlight just how effing weird the events are.

 

[GNTLGNT]

...I prefer fantastical things set against the hum drum of real life...

 

[Arcadevere]

Real world setting makes the character felt realistic even though he/she has a fictional ability. Because it will make you wonder that "is it real?" "Do we have a chance to obtain that kind of power?" "Do those things happen in real life scenario" or "HOW?". (Which IMO, is an evidence for a novel to be successful)

Everyone agrees (even those lil' sh*tz at Goodreads) that Mr. K's strongest factor in his novel is realistic characters with fictional abilities (with the exception of some who has a realistic abilities) in a realistic world, so setting is a great factor in every Stephen King novels (and also to all fictions and non fictions)

 

[mal]

IMO I think details of the setting provide a lot of insight that make the book/scene/story richer and therefore more 'real'. Depending on the context, this could include detritus from pants pockets on a bedside table, yielding us fuller information about the character. Also, it tells me different things if a man walks by with a windbreaker, or, a man walks by with a 'North Face' jacket. I guess I prefer more information than less. In movies, it seems to be a different ball of wax as details can be seen and do not need to be written about. Interesting topic. mal

 

[skimom2]

Just IMO, but, for part of the appeal of SK is the extraordinary happening to ordinary people. So that means the setting has to be ordinary to highlight just how effing weird the events are.

Bingo. Couldn't have said it better.

 

[skimom2]

Fantasy is a horse of a different color--it can be effective (or ineffective) whether it has a realistic setting or not.

 

[Mynxie]

I have a foot in both camps re this Q. I think a sense of realism heightens horror / fantasy - apply certain situs to everyday life / society / places and it can be imagined, easily enough, for the sense of horror to become reality. You can imagine the chaos if, for example, diseases are released and destroyed society as we know it - bringing out the best / worst in people.... creating an environment which we couldnt imagine to the 'nth' degree in this current culture.

But the same can be said for a fantasy setting - you can only go so for with a fantasy setting before your imagination kicks in and begins to play a part.... which in my mind, can also heighten the impact.

My response probably wont make much sense and i am rereading it to try and make myself clearer...... but it just isnt happening (Go***mn the aftereffects of an afternoon long anxiety attack)

 

[muskrat]

If it's genuine creep-out horror you're going for, I'd say keep the setting as grounded in reality as you can. Downplay all supernatural elements. Go sparingly with the gore, at least at first. Tease your readers with a gradual build-up of these elements--don't toss it at em like Jackson Pollack. Slowly seduce your readers with horror. Keep them comfortable awhile, cozy, make em feel at home. Then jab em with an ice pick.

 

[mjs9153]

They must have used a realistic setting for this one,even the cat got scared! Must have been a SK movie..

 

[Doc Creed]

...I prefer fantastical things set against the hum drum of real life...

Exactly. Well said, Scott. Btw...I'm going (on your recommendation) to read more Koontz. There's probably 25 or more that I haven't yet read.

 

[Mr Nobody]

To sell a lie you have to tell the truth. The bigger and more outrageous the lie, the more it has to be bedded in what is true (whether it's a truth felt or a truth intellectually known). That doesn't necessarily mean it's the known or everyday world. Take Alien for example. It's set on a spaceship of the type we know doesn't yet exist as well as on an alien world. It's in the future. The 'truth' comes from the crew. They're just working stiffs, something we can all recognise and can hang a hat on.
The horror comes mostly from the way the routine and everyday suddenly lurches into nightmare - something we all fear (not in the details, just the 'the everyday suddenly going sideways' element) - but because the crew members seem true to life, the horror (the lie) is easily sold.

 

[Gerald]

Not every fantastic writer is as precise about his settings though. For example Poe sometimes only gives you an initial of a place or only part of a date (not sure what his reasons were for not fully giving a name of a location, or a date in those cases). Still his horror is very effective, which makes me wonder if it's really necessary to give all those details.
A lot of details about things not strictly necessary for the main plot, may enrich the tale as a whole and create a sense of a complete world, but I wonder if they are really all that much needed to make something more scary or suspenseful.

Realism is actually in fantasy too. Yes, Westeros, Mid-World and Middle-Earth are not real places, but there is as much if not more detail as in books about the real world. I think the fantasy-genre even demands that there is a completely thought-out world.

I've always struggled with setting. I get ideas, characters and can write a story, but I'm never so sure where to set it. Should you set it where you live because you know that place well? But then you're limiting yourself too. Also, the Netherlands has never been a country with a horror-tradition - it's visually rather ordinary looking - it doesn't really speak so much to the imagination. There are few Dutch horror-writers or horror-novels.
Although it has to be said that Van Helsing came from Amsterdam, although Dracula never takes place there.

Do you feel you actually have to live in or know a place well to write about it or would research suffice? And could a horrorstory basically be set in any country/place - for example could you imagine a horrorstory taking place where you're living?

 

[doowopgirl]

Not every fantastic writer is as precise about his settings though. For example Poe sometimes only gives you an initial of a place or only part of a date (not sure what his reasons were for not fully giving a name of a location, or a date in those cases). Still his horror is very effective, which makes me wonder if it's really necessary to give all those details.
A lot of details about things not strictly necessary for the main plot, may enrich the tale as a whole and create a sense of a complete world, but I wonder if they are really all that much needed to make something more scary or suspenseful.

Realism is actually in fantasy too. Yes, Westeros, Mid-World and Middle-Earth are not real places, but there is as much if not more detail as in books about the real world. I think the fantasy-genre even demands that there is a completely thought-out world.

I've always struggled with setting. I get ideas, characters and can write a story, but I'm never so sure where to set it. Should you set it where you live because you know that place well? But then you're limiting yourself too. Also, the Netherlands has never been a country with a horror-tradition - it's visually rather ordinary looking - it doesn't really speak so much to the imagination. There are few Dutch horror-writers or horror-novels.
Although it has to be said that Van Helsing came from Amsterdam, although Dracula never takes place there.

Do you feel you actually have to live in or know a place well to write about it or would research suffice? And could a horrorstory basically be set in any country/place - for example could you imagine a horrorstory taking place where you're living?

I get your point. But I think a horror story can take place anywhere. For me, that is the point of King lulling you into the quiet and ordinariness of suburbia. I'm not talking about the behind closed doors of abuse, but the horror like in It.

 

[Gerald]

I get your point. But I think a horror story can take place anywhere. For me, that is the point of King lulling you into the quiet and ordinariness of suburbia. I'm not talking about the behind closed doors of abuse, but the horror like in It.

I would think too that a horrorstory can take place anywhere. It's just harder to imagine a horrorstory in your country if there are none of them.
Also, the majority of horrorstories is English - either from Brittain or the US - that's where all the well-known horrorwriters come from. I'm sure there are horrorwriters in other countries too, but you never hear about them. I couldn't name any horrorwriter that's not from the US or UK.

I also suppose if you can write about a time you haven't lived in (something taking place in the past), you also could write about an actual place even if you haven't lived there.

 

[GNTLGNT]

Exactly. Well said, Scott. Btw...I'm going (on your recommendation) to read more Koontz. There's probably 25 or more that I haven't yet read.

....I think you'll be pleased, some are a bit redundant of others-yet the overall experience will be both touching and at times, hilarious......

 

[Gerald]

Concerning that 'suburbia feel': I think a constant in King's work is his sense of a 'community'. There are always loads of characters in his books, a good number of whom just remain names that are mentioned in passing. Even short stories can be like that (like The Reach for example). And there is always a sense of topography: a number of towns, an area.

I think this is one of the main pleasures of reading King, I suppose it's a big part why he is so successful. It's like you actually visit that place and meet the characters in it. Even without supernatural events, that part would still be enjoyable. It's about those towns and the people and their habits, characteristics, interactions etc.
Even when it takes a while for the supernatural to set in, you're already at ease with these characters and feel like you know them.

I was just watching a horrorfilm, which was not particularly good, but it had that same sense of a place where everybody knows everybody. And that's quintessentially King I think. You have these towns where nobody can keep a secret (I tend to think this a romanticized view of small towns - probably some are like that, but not as a rule I think) and into these communities comes an otherworldly or supernatural threat (or sometimes a realistic one) and how are they gonna survive? Somehow that combination of the very ordinary and the unknown is very attractive.

 

[Walter Oobleck]

Might as well post this one...I thought Hunger Games lacking at times in the descriptive. Katniss is in a tree. Oh? Or later, Katniss goes to the capitol...I only read the first in the series. But I got nothing...first time there for her and it makes zero impression on her. The writer is capable of descriptive writing, that does exist other places in the story. But for me the description was tame, lacking real definition. But they lined up at the box office, so, really? I've read stories that describe characters entering a bar...restaurant...fill-in-the-blank, and that description has been lacking, often only the single noun used. So what? Restaurant? Bar? Store? Sheesh...every place has their shingle hanging outside on a board or painted on the glass. How'd they know it is a "restaurant" or whatever. Read a story, one setting, Chicago...and that setting was tame...wasn't in Chicago, been there. Take one of King's stories and index it...make a note of every character, real, imagined, famous, periphery. Did that for...Doctor Sleep I think it was...12-pages long, single-spaced...a bum outside Golden’s Discount Liquors & Import Beers...Two ladies doling out pizza, Frazier AA meeting...oops, not Doctor Sleep...that was only 5-6 pages. Mercede's I meant, 12-pages...Guidebook-toting retirees and junior high school mouth-breathers. There's four or five pages of "real" people.

 

[The Nameless]

In my humble opinion, yes, horror in a fantasy setting is less effective. I can only use the dark tower as a reference because it's the only fantasy series I've read, but take rhea of the coos for example, she can use magic to manipulate people. In the dark tower's setting that is just a simple fact - if she casts a spell on you it's your own fault for dealing with a known witch, you play with fire, you get burnt. Reading this setting is mostly about the showdown between the good guy and the bad guy.

If rhea was in a story set in modern England or America (or anywhere real), it's no longer a normal thing that a woman is an actual magic witch. The fact that she can use magic against someone becomes the main element in the story, it's no longer just good vs bad, there is now something out of place, something that shouldn't be able to happen. That's where the horror comes from.

As for the little details in describing the location/setting, I think the way king does it makes a massive difference to how much you enjoy the story. He paints a great mental image for you to get absorbed in. I think he tends to describe the fictional (but realistic) places he creates or the creative liberties he takes with real places more vividly than real places. Both instances are present in 11.22.63 with jodie (fictional) being beautifully described, and Lisbon falls (real with creative liberties taken) the same. this is one of the reasons was able to get so absorbed in it (the amazing story telling also helps).

I have said before though that he tends to go over board with some descriptive details, especially with technology.

 

[Gerald]

I think you can conclude that the purpose of the setting in a contemporary horrornovel set in the real world is familiarity. It's 'the world you know'. This is what makes it feel realistic despite the supernatural elements, it grounds those elements.

However there is a Dutch writer right now who had a hit here with a horrornovel set in our own country, but when he sold the international rights he rewrote the novel to set it in the US. The novel is called Hex, SK just recommended it on Twitter.
The problem is, he said, that internationally the Dutch culture is not well-known, making the novel less effective for foreign readers. The US (and UK) however are internationally well-known - I'd say more because of film and tv than because of books - so that's why all over the world people read American writers like SK.
So, there's an advantage to writers from the US and UK that writers in other countries don't have: the country where it takes place is immediately more recognisable to foreign readers as well as domestic obviously.

It goes for film too. European films seldom become big hits in the US, and yet we watch American films here all the time - they're usually bigger hits than the (far fewer) films that are made here (every once in a while a film from our country becomes a big hit nationally too, but not too often).