: Re: Can I use a public university as the setting for my fiction? The odds of actually publishing are low, but just in case, I wanted to know if using a public university campus as a setting

In order for a lawsuit to prevail, a statement has to be 1) untrue, 2) reasonably taken to be true, and 3) be highly offensive to a reasonable person.

Let's take the third. Everyone knows that tragic events happen at universities all the time. These occur all the time, including suicides, natural deaths, and date rape. The fact that something "unfortunate" supposedly happened on university premises would not "offend" a reasonable person, unless you allege that the university did or failed to do something (negligence) that caused your unfortunate events. Put another way, "defamation" does not occur if the "sting" of your fictitious events is no greater than that of events that actually happen at the university.

Your second defense is to put up the standard disclaimers that serve as a "signal" of fiction so that things aren't reasonably taken to be true; that e.g. "this is a work of fiction. Any resemblances between fictitious and real people are purely coincidental." To make the signal stronger, you misspell the university's name slightly, say, "Yael" instead of "Yale." That signals that you are operating in a parallel universe.

Note, the above is my (non-lawyer's) interpretation of U.S. law. Libel law in places like the U.K. are more pro plaintiff.

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: Re: Can I use a public university as the setting for my fiction? The odds of actually publishing are low, but just in case, I wanted to know if using a public university campus as a setting

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: Better Ways of Showing Fear In my current novel, I'm dealing with very scary creatures that never fail to fill my protagonist with fear, but I always have her doing the same thing. My character

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