In the novel "The Alienist" by Caleb Carr, the setting of the novel greatly influences the way the author has written the book and what the book is about. The novel deals with a serial killer who kidnaps young male prostitutes and brutally murders them, taking out their eyes and severing limbs. The other main characters are a rag-tag group of reporters, detectives and doctors led by Dr. Kreizler whose job is to secretly try and find the murderer and stop his killing spree.

The setting of the novel for the most part is in New York, at the turn of the 19th century. The reason this time and place are particularly important will become evident shortly. First lets look at a bit of history during this time period. As it is well known the turn of the century was the time of a great industrialization, and a time when thousands upon thousands o

Setting is crucial in every story, it governs interaction of all the characters, how the story will work, and the eventual outcome of the story. In "The Alienist", one can truly see the importance of setting in the story. It allowed the author to play with the characters and modify them to his liking. Clever thinking on the part of Caleb Carr, as he thought out everything, even to the tiniest details, like the diverse ethnic backgrounds of dinners the group consumes and how only in New York they can be found in the same area. The time frame of the setting is also incredibly important.

Had the story been set at any other, the killer would not have been able to continue his killing. For instance, if it were set in today's time, fingerprints, DNA, and other forensic science tools would greatly help, the population would be warned of the killer and safety measures would be taken. On the other hand, had it been set earlier in the time frame, when the population of New York wasn't so large, the murders also would have been noticed, and there wouldn't have been such a large group of people living impoverished. The buildings wouldn't have been as large, which means that he wouldn't have prefered New York city because of his climbing ambitions. All these factors have been combined to create a perfect location for this character to carry out his murders.

f people believed that America was the land of opportunity and hope. American nation needed a labor force and allowed many immigrants to flock to eastern seaboard cities. Unfortunately this led to overcrowding of these cities, which was th

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Approximate Word count = 1074
Approximate Pages = 4 (250 words per page double spaced)