Creating a Sense of Place

 One of the books that most captivated me I'm 2025 was Ocean Vuong's most recent novel The Emperor of Gladness. The story of Hai, a young Vietnamese American, opens with a rich description of East Gladness, Connecticut, the town where he lives. Even before Vuong introduces readers to his quirky cast of characters, who become chosen family, he sets the stage.

As I read the opening chapter, I thought about how readers sometimes skim over the descriptive passages, eager to get to the action, as if it's no more than filler. I know I've probably done the same. But Vuong drew me in immediately, making real a place I've never visited--in a state I've never visited. The introduction felt like a promise that the writing to come would measure up; it did. I often forget a lot about books I read, once I've moved on, but I have clear images of the streets and businesses of East Gladness. I know the little house Hai ends up sharing with Grazina, the elderly Lithuanian immigrant who essentially saves his life while she is losing her grasp on her on. Vuong's insight into human nature proves as keen as his eye for the details of the place in which he sets his story. 

Patrick Ryan's novel Buckeye, my first book completed in 2026, began similarly, with a description of the fictional town of Bonhomie, Ohio. The description of the town in the early part of the twentieth century bore no resemblance to East Gladness, CT, but if literary descriptions were works of visual art, the two chapters would hang in the same wing of the museum. As the characters grow up and grow old, the change in the town is reflected: the hardware store where Cal works for his father-in-law increases in size, the plant where Felix Salt worked in management before he left for the war also thrives; neighborhoods grow and merge, so that when Margaret Salt returns after a twenty-year absence, she is aware of the changes in a way that those who never left may be unaware. The reader takes note.

When teaching reading or writing, I often talked about how setting can be very specific--Bonhomie, OH, from WWII through the Vietnam war--or general--long ago and far away. The latter lets readers pick and choose from their own memories or imagination; the former can take a fictional time and place and set the reader right down in the middle of it. When done well--as in these two novels--it works.

Creating a Sense of Place