SETTING THESAURUS

BADLANDS



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HELPFUL TIP:

Settings should always be chosen with care. Consider the emotion you want your viewpoint character to feel and how setting choices, weather elements, and symbolism might build a specific mood in the scene, create tension and conflict, or even raise the stakes.
SIGHTS:
Tall and unusual red and yellow rock formations resulting from wind and water erosion
Cracked clay beds where water once flowed
Sandy trails through bumpy terrain created by animals
Sandstone or limestone rock walls
Rock arches
Flat-topped buttes 
Small fossils on slabs of stone
Deep fissures and dry ravines
Thin rock spires (hoodoos) that rise like unsteady obelisks
A jagged ridgeline separating the sky from the earth
Animal skulls and skeletons picked clean by scavengers and bleached by the sun
Wide canyons
Stunted yet hardy trees and bushes (juniper, green ash, sagebrush, buckbrush)
Prickly flowering plants (coneflower, thistle, milkweed)
Clumps of spiny cacti and wild grass (cordgrass, buffalo grass, foxtail, blue grama)
Jackrabbits resting in the shade of a boulder or beneath a bush
Rock wrens burrowing into holes in the tall rock walls
Reptiles (scorpions, snakes, lizards) scampering from rock to bush 
An open blue sky streaked with clouds
Hikers wearing day packs
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SOUNDS:
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SMELLS:
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TASTES:
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TEXTURES AND SENSATIONS:
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POSSIBLE SOURCES OF CONFLICT:
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PEOPLE COMMONLY FOUND IN THIS SETTING:
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SETTING NOTES AND TIPS:
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SETTING DESCRIPTION EXAMPLE:
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TECHNIQUES AND DEVICES USED:
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DESCRIPTIVE EFFECTS:
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