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Family trips can be fun, however, they can also become frightening and sometimes dangerous experiences. For example, many years ago on a camping trip with my family, I wondered off into the woods and became disoriented. Without knowing where I was or how to return to familiar surroundings, I felt trapped and began to panic. Alone in the dark woods I was filled with feelings of isolation and fear. Similarly, in “A Good Man is Hard to Find” by Flannery O’Connor, the deserted road that Bailey’s family turns onto is ominous. O’Connor uses this setting along with dialog and foreshadowing to impart to the reader that the family is, in a way, facing their own impending doom, trapped in the back country of Georgia. There are two specific elements to the setting that O’Connor uses to create a sense of apprehension and despair. First, she reveals the family’s remote location by describing the deep, dark woods on both sides of a long and windy dirt road, which “looked as if no one had traveled on it in months” (Rogers & Jacobs 430). From this depiction of the setting, the reader becomes aware that the family is completely on their own, miles away from the nearest town, or farm.
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