By Gina Kim and Megan Scott
AASFE Diversity Fellows

It’s all about the place.
That’s according to best-selling author John Berendt.
Berendt, 67, swapped Manhattan’s Upper West Side for Savannah for five years before writing the non-fiction novel “Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil.” The main character is the city of Savannah, Ga., with a cast of eccentrics being secondary.
And his most recent book, “The City of Fallen Angels,” published in 2005, spotlights Venice, Italy, more than anything else.
 “If you don’t know where you are, you don’t know who you are,” said Berendt, quoting writer Wendell Barry during his keynote address at the AASFE conference in Savannah on Thursday. “I pay attention to the surroundings, a look of a place.”
Berendt spent nine years researching Venice, taking intensive Italian language classes and befriending its residents before writing “The City of Fallen Angels.” He stumbled upon the quirks of Savannah in the 1980s, visiting the city because of cheap airfares and staying because of the people.
“[Savannah] is a world apart and in and of itself,” he said. “If a young kid is stopped on a highway for speeding, it’s not his license and registration the policeman asks for, it’s ‘Who’s your daddy?’”
Berendt recognizes that journalists under deadline pressure may not have the luxury of time, but he still emphasized the importance of describing the scene and then letting characters “step out of a landscape.”
“The best American literature has always been regional,” he said.
He added that the South is the most identifiable region in the country – with it’s own language, food and culture.