Here’s the next BAIPA Morning Workshop!

Like our monthly meetings, these events are exclusively on Zoom, at least until we get through this COVID-19 crisis. The Zoom links will be provided to you via email on the Friday evening before, around 9 PM.

EVERYONE MUST REGISTER
for this two-hour workshop.

Member tickets are $25.00, Non-Member tickets are $40. There is also a $15 Recording Only ticket for Members.

Members MUST log in first. Then please scroll down to the bottom of this page for the ticket selection area.

The workshop WILL be recorded and the video will be shared with all paid ticket holders within 48 hours. 

Setting That Works

How Memorable Setting Can Advance Plot, Reveal Character, Echo Theme, and More

with John Byrne Barry, Author & BAIPA Board Member

The most memorable and effective setting is more than a pretty or gritty description. It’s lean and strong because it’s working hard. Doing two or more jobs. Not just showing the reader where the story is taking place, but also advancing your plot, unifying various elements of your story, revealing character, echoing theme, setting mood, and more.

The primary job of setting, of course, is still most important—to immerse readers in the scene. So they can visualize it, feel it, smell it, so that they are there with your characters.

There are going to be times when the setting does nothing more, and that’s fine. But as often as possible, you want your setting to be doing more than one job.

Here are the eight “jobs” setting can do:

1. Advance story
2. Drive the story
3. Define character, change character, reveal character
4. Establish rules (science fiction, historical fiction)
5. Unify the story
6. Convey mood and tone
7. Echo theme.
8. Serve as metaphor

This workshop will include writing exercises to develop skills in:

• Making sure your setting does more than one job.
• Being deliberate about point of view. Who is doing the describing? What emotions does your character have when she encounters a setting?
• Adding sensual detail. (Not just how something looks.)
• Deciding where the camera is. How close? How far? From whose perspective?
• Identifying the “telling detail”.

About Our Speaker

John Byrne Barry is a writer, designer, actor, pickleball player, and crossing guard.

He is author of three plays and three novels, including When I Killed My Father: An Assisted-Suicide Family Thriller and Bones in the Wash: Politics is Tough. Family is Tougher.

Learn more about John at johnbyrnebarry.com and in his BAIPA profile.