Beautiful Creatures by Kami Garcia & Margaret Stohl

The setting of Beautiful Creatures is Gatlin, South Carolina, where nothing out of the ordinary ever happens.  Gatlin is a simple, small town where everybody knows each other and practically everything about each other.  Lena, a very unordinary character, moves to the town and everything changes.  The people of the town insist that she be removed because she is not like everybody else.  They view Lena as an outcast and believe she is dangerous.  This setting is an archetypical setting because it is expected that everybody in a small town knows each other, and these people do not accept outsiders, or those that are different.  It is also expected that a protagonist moves to town and challenges the so-called 'rules' about what is normal and who is accepted into society.  A quote to support this statement is, "Gatlin wasn't a complicated place; Gatlin was Gatlin.  The neighbors kept watch from their porches in the unbearable heat, sweltering in plain sight.  But there was no point.  Nothing ever changed...There were no surprises in Gatlin County...Turns out I couldn't have been more wrong." (Garcia, 6-7).  This quote shows how Gatlin is small and has no surprises ever.  But it also sets up the plot, foreshadowing that something new and different was about to happen.

 

 

Below is a trailer for Beautiful Creatures.  In the beginning of the trailer, it has scenes showing some of the people in Gatlin talking about Lena and how she is different.  Based on what they say in the trailer, we can infer that the citizens of Gatlin are not very accepting of outsiders, making the setting an archetypical setting.