Building Worlds

by Allison Pang

It seems to me that world building is often one of those things that falls under personal preference. As writers, we certainly need to be able to convey the sense of time and place so that our readers can connect and understand what's going on. For some stories, world building may need to be intensive and full of rich description...and for others it's merely window dressing. (And both can work just fine, depending on the type of story.)

In a lot of ways, it's the audience that is key. The hard core sci-fi and fantasy crowd often tends to expect a greater attention to world building and detail. And as pointed out earlier this week - a story set in our world doesn't usually need the same amount of description as something being written from scratch. Unless it's a fish out of water story, where perhaps said character has never actually seen a car before, but that's usually a special case.

And of course - actual writing style makes a huge difference. I'll call on Tolkien, for example - as the "godfather" for the modern fantasy epic, no one can deny the sheer amount of influence his works have had on the fantasy genres as we know them - everything from Dungeon & Dragons to pretty much every movie or book involving a dwarf or an elf or an orc has him to thank for it.

But I'll tell you what? As much as I like the overall stories...I find his writing descriptive to the point of painfulness sometimes. And often dry. (And they are also basically white male sausage parties, but that's a post for another day.)

 On two chairs beneath the bole of the tree and canopied by a living bough there sat, side by side, Celeborn and Galadriel. Very tall they were, and the Lady no less tall than the Lord; and they were grave and beautiful. They were clad wholly in white; and the hair of the Lady was of deep gold, and the hair of the Lord Celeborn was of silver long and bright; but no sign of age was upon them, unless it were in the depths of their eyes; for these were keen as lances in the starlight, and yet profound, the wells of deep memory.

It's beautiful stuff, but reading passage after passage of it? Yeah. I suspect it would be a hard sell in today's book market.

On the other hand? Don't mess with Tolkien fans:



What I find most interesting about world building in general is that if done right, it can become its own mythos. Think Star Wars, or Star Trek or Dr. Who, or DC/Marvel comics, or Transformers, or Harry Potter. Most writers or creators should ever be so lucky to have fandoms that sit around and argue the semantics of what was said or done in movie x or issue y. (And in made-up languages, no less. I had a guy who sat behind me in high school that spoke Klingon. I myself have a large hardcover book that goes through the lore and history of a certain video game. I also gleefully watch flame wars on forums as fans freak out about what character x would taste like if drinks lyrium, but you know. Whatever.)

Though fandom has a dark side too, as evidenced as this video. (I'm sorry Brony, but I'm pretty sure My Little Pony is really for kids.)
That being said, I'm a big fan of organic world building. I don't need to have everything set up for me - give me characters I can relate to and let me learn about it as I go. Part of this personal preference - I don't enjoy info dumps - and part of that is because I tend to hold onto to relevant piece of information better if I can relate to it. (If it's important to a character I connect with, it becomes important to me.)

When it comes to my own writing, I tend to keep notes on things - whether it's for books or comics - usually to keep things straight. Even if it's information that might never make it into the book, it helps with the overall story and I can use snippets of that info to spice up the world building. For example - I may have an entire trade route mapped out between cities and the sorts of merchants and what they are trading - but even though it might be important for ME to know the price of gold widgets, unless it contributes directly to the story, it doesn't need to be there. I might have a character comment on it - "Gee, the price of gold widgets has gone up again. Hope they fix that bridge soon."

Maybe it doesn't affect the plot, but hey, we now know the character is observant of such things in his/her world...or maybe they express surprise at this bit of knowledge, or fear, or anger - basically it helps drive home the fact that there is a least some impact upon this person's life. (Just like we might observe the price of gas, for example - it helps lend an element of reality into the fantasy.)

The one thing to watch out for is world rules. Most of us have seen it before - whatever rules you set up for your world, do not break them without really good reason...and then, only sparingly. (Unless your world...has no rules, a la Alice in Wonderland, in which case, have at it.) Or your world is now written by a lot of extra people, like popular comics. In which case, the powers that be can wave their hands and retcon whatever they like. Superman and Lois Lane together forever? Nonsense. Lois is gone and now Superman and Wonder Woman can get it on!

This sort of thing does tend to irritate readers and fans though, so proceed with caution.

Unless you're talking about Highlander, in which case you're free to ignore the second movie with its whacked out alien sub-plot and move right on to three and four like everyone else did. Including the directors.

For my latest WIP, its been a very interesting challenge. It's told through 1st person present, and the protagonist is an illiterate gutter-rat who ends up getting caught up in all sorts of interesting political intrigue (among other things.)

So, how to portray the world through her eyes without  overwhelming or confusing the reader, or magically having the protagonist jump to conclusions which would be pretty unlikely for her to reach, given her limited education?  (She's street smart, mind, but books are useless.)

That's the fun part, I suppose. :)

World-Building: Spice, Carrot, or Meat?

Setting. World-Building. Whatever you call it, is it a spice in your word stew or is it the carrots?

If it's the meat, we'll be asleep by page five.

Jeffe, ever the champion of "keep it moving" as demonstrated in the many novellas to her name, reminds us in her post that lush world-building is a luxury in which not every story should invest. If your setting is a common/recognizable environment, then a few sentences and you're done. Those sentences are dedicated more to establishing the atmosphere/mood than actual landscape.

However, as Lucy mentioned in her post yesterday, it is possible for setting be a character; especially in SF/F. As such, it merits turns through the footlights. Go ahead, paint the highlights and note the shadows. But don't spend too long on it or you'll distract the reader from the action going on in the spotlight.

What two cents do I have to add? Dear Readers, I still struggle with how and when to dole out the details of the foreign worlds so very vivid inside my head. I desperately want to share the mad genius in the construction of the streets, the decline of the water purification stations, the fluctuations of the treasury, and the cycle of crop rotations...

Yeah, but...No.

I have to rein in my enthusiasm; otherwise, my word stew is really a turducken and a food coma is imminent.  I mean, I have to cut way, way back. I'm one of those authors who has to heed the "use less than 10% of what you want to tell them and parse it out slowly" advice.  My first drafts are inevitably too heavy on the details of the world. I edit my world-building by forcing myself to view everything through my protagonist's eyes and by answering the following questions:

Would she actually notice that? Why?

Non-natives to a land make note of the bigger picture in the beginning and pay attention to details when events force them to. Indigenous people notice change to their environment, and that change is a precursor to an event. It might seem a subtle difference between when/how details are revealed, but it's a difference that plays into the ever-important pacing of a scene and the story.

Dear Readers, do you have a method for policing your world-building? I'd love to learn how you balance your word stew!

Setting and World-Building - Keep It Concise!

On my way home through LAX last week, I passed this little scene. That airport is terrific for having these charging/work desk laptop stations. Both mom and daughter were equally absorbed in what they were doing. (The daughter's device is also plugged in.) Some might complain that they should be talking to each other, but I love that they shared this - such a companionable moment.

You can draw a lot from the setting. If I hadn't told you, you might not have guessed it was an airport. But the woman's carry-on bag suggests travel. The tile floor looks like a public space and the big pillar tells you it's a large one. The tropical plants hint at a warm weather location. You might be able to figure out that the bench to the left is a shoeshine stand - also indicative of an airport, bus or train station - and the keen-eyed might catch that the slice of lighted sign to the right is a concourse map. Perhaps there are other clues you picked up - if so, share!

In this way, we talk about a picture being worth a thousand words. (Although the above was only 180.) I've never particularly liked that adage. (It turns out to have kind of a weird provenance. And if you go to that link, consider donating the $3 to wikipedia's fundraiser - they're a non-profit and deserve at least that much.) Also, this bit is really amusing:

Another ad by Barnard appears in the March 10, 1927 issue with the phrase "One Picture Worth Ten Thousand Words," where it is labeled a Chinese proverb. The Home Book of Proverbs, Maxims, and Familiar Phrases quotes Barnard as saying he called it "a Chinese proverb, so that people would take it seriously." Soon after, the proverb would become popularly attributed to Confucius.

The reason I don't like it - and ironic to me that it's originally attributed to a newspaper editor - is that it implies that words fail where a picture succeeds. The adage also suggests that many, many words are needed to convey a story.

I don't believe this.

Now, I'm a concise writer. Always have been, really. My Master's Thesis was the shortest in the department - and not because the project wasn't complex. It was a honed-down PhD project. My developmental edits are unfailingly to add text - I'm *never* asked to trim words. And I know this leaves some readers behind. At the same time, I have trouble reading authors who feel to me like they retread the same concepts/problems/angst endlessly.

Just last week, I got involved in a Twitter convo where someone said something along the lines of "in a 100K book, you can't have good world-building and [X]." I don't really remember what [X] was - it might have been a good romantic arc. But we were discussing the balance of romance, action and world-building in a story and which preponderance made it fantasy vs. romance. At any rate, I said that I thought an author can do excellent world-building in 100K, regardless of the rest of the story.

Key to Jargon for non-industry types:
100K -> 100,000 word novel. The typical novel ranges from 80K to 120K
World-building -> creating a world different from our reality, particularly relevant in fantasy where the world is *entirely* different from ours, e.g., also knows as setting

 It doesn't take a lot to establish the setting. Just as in the picture above, a few key hints tell you everything you need to know. I think this is important. Some authors get heavy into world-building, wanting to tell you all about it - from the ecosystem to the various races all the way up to the thousand-year history. You'll note that all of that stuff is BACKGROUND. As in, the stage setting. It's not the actual story. Yes, the author absolutely needs to know those things, but - and this is a big BUT - she doesn't need to tell the reader all of it.

So, in answer to the Bordello's Topic of the Week (see how I made you read all the way through to find out? I would say clever me, but I didn't do it on purpose), Setting: How Much is Too Much?, I'd say anything that isn't directly relevant to the story is too much. Sure, that internecine war over corn crops is a great bit, but it's not relevant until the corn shortage impacts the main characters.

Notice that I specify main characters there - no secondary spin-offs away from the primary action. I know this isn't the Fantasy Way, but it's the Jeffe Way, for better or worse. This way I have plenty of words left over for important stuff.

Like sex scenes. :D