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About the book

Most authors only use setting as a backdrop

They mistakenly believe that setting is only the place where the story occurs. They create flat, one-dimensional worlds that fail to engage readers, or else they bury the reader under details that don’t matter and hide the story they’re trying to tell.

Discover and use practical principles to help you:

  1. boost your story’s impact by understanding all four levels of setting and how they can be used to highlight your characters’ growth and change over the course of the story,
  2. weave in sensory details that create a unique and memorable setting that pops,
  3. engage readers by creating layers of meaning through the use of objects and symbols,
  4. focus in on what small changes in setting can do to make your characters come alive on the page, and
  5. intensify and highlight story conflict—both within and between characters.

We start with an introduction to the four different layers of setting and the role character growth and change plays in creating a satisfying story for the reader. Then we break down each phase of the character arc, providing practical prompts and suggestions for how the author can use setting to illustrate the changes in their character at each stage.

Click the buy button now to ensure you’re getting the most out of your story settings, taking advantage of every opportunity to emotionally engage your reader, and adding depth and meaning to your work. Make every detail count.

Why we’re the authors ready to help you level up your writing

With dozens of published books between us, we’ve sat right where you’re sitting now with your rear end firmly planted in your writing chair, and a desire to level up your storytelling. We’ve sweated over how to make our characters come to life and how to weave stories that keep readers turning pages. In addition to our own experience as authors, we’re co-founders and mentors in the Creative Academy for Writers, an online community with members writing and publishing worldwide.

This is the seventh Creative Academy Guide for Writers. Be sure to check out the rest of the titles in this series.

 

CheatSheet: How to use Setting to show Character Arc from Build Better Settings by Eileen Cook and Crystal Hunt

CLICK HERE to download Cheat Sheet 

excerpted from Build Better Settings © 2023 by Eileen Cook & Crystal Hunt


What is character arc?

The term character arc is a fancy way of saying your character’s inner journey over the course of the story. Not in the physical sense of where they travel, but how their experiences change them in meaningful ways. Your character starts off as one person and then a series of events happen to them and as a result of those events and your character’s responses to them, they are changed. Often it is this change that allows your character to triumph in some way at the end of the book. 

 

Six Stages of Character Arc

Let’s start off with a look at the six stages of character arc, and what we can expect at each stage. 

 1) Initial State: When the story opens the character is in their “natural” state (whatever that may be in their life) and nothing out of the ordinary has happened to them yet. In this stage we’re establishing who they are before the story starts. This reality has usually been built around a belief that happens because of the character’s emotional wound, but they may or may not be aware of it at this time. 

 

2) Unhappiness: This stage is after the inciting event has happened and the character is feeling drawn to (or compelled) to make some changes. Something has happened (a catalyst) that has upset their ordinary world and as a result they feel the first hints of friction in their lives.

 

3) Transformation Begins: The character begins their journey and starts (or thinks about, or tries) to do things differently. 

 

4) The Mirror Moment: Typically the mid-point of the story, this is where the character reflects on who they will become. This is often seen as the point of no return. Your character at this point has been through some things. This is where they need to commit to a change and push forward. 

 

5) The Dark Moment: This story point happens roughly around the three quarter point of the narrative. The title of this stage likely gives it away, but this is when your character is at their lowest. They don’t see how they can move forward and succeed. It seems to them that all is lost. 

 

6) Transformation Complete: At this point your character has been through the final battle of your story (whether internal or external) and have completed their change. They are now in their new reality. 


How do you know if your character has an arc?

If you’re wondering if your character has any arc, ask yourself what would happen if your character skipped the entire first ¾ of the book and found themselves, as they are in the opening pages, dropped into your climax scene. How would they respond? Would they survive? For almost all characters, the answer to that is they would not fare well. Which is actually a good thing (storywise, anyways).

 

How can you use setting to show character arc?

There are many ways to highlight the fact that changes have occurred within your character. 

If we’re trying to show an internal change (something inside the character has changed causing them to see the familiar setting in a new way) then we need to make it clear so the reader that it’s not the physical setting that has changed. It’s the way the character is viewing that setting. 

 If we’re trying to show an external change (something in the setting has changed), which has meaning to the reader and the story, then we need to make it clear to the reader that something in the physical environment is different and call their attention to it. 

 In every case we need to identify which character’s viewpoint we’re looking through when we’re interacting with the setting.

 

There are four primary combinations of characters and settings we can make use of to show change. 

  1. Same character, in the same setting
  2. Different character, in the same setting
  3. Same character, in a different setting
  4. Different character, in a different setting

 

And then we need to ask and answer the following questions:  

  1. What do they see? 
  2. What do they think about what they see? 
  3. What will they say or not say? 
  4. What will they do or not do? 
  5. How does this reveal setting to the reader?
  6. How does revealing those details about setting show that the character has (or hasn’t) changed?

     

 Answering these questions is a great way to pull together all these details into some specifics about what is going to happen in your scene to reveal this change to the reader. You can take a deep dive into all the details with us in the book. Check it out here.