Continue the Conversation: Worldbuilding

Tonight, we discussed:

1. Begin with your central ideas.
2. Talk to yourself about it.
3. If it looks like a rabbit, call it a rabbit.
4. Don’t make rules before you have to.
5. To be unique, be specific.
   • Harry Potter doesn’t just have a wand, he has a 11” long wand made of a holly with a phoenix feather core. Also, Molly Weasley’s clock. (Entire family in mortal peril 24/7)
   • A memoir set in Virginia doesn’t just have street names, it has streets named after English kings, Confederate generals, and lots and lots of Civil War cemeteries.
   • Han Solo doesn’t just have a spaceship, he has the Millennium Falcon.
6. Listen to your inner troll.
   • Question: If you have abolished all need, want, and poverty with replicator technology, who mines the dilithium crystals that powers it?
   • Answer: Obviously people who have dreamed all their lives of living on dark, forsaken asteroids at the ass end of nowhere.
7. Follow your decisions to their logical conclusion.
8. Be balanced. What you show of the world has to serve the story. You’re not showcasing your world. 90% of your world isn’t going to show up on the page, but you as the author have to know it.
9. Know when to stop. Your readers don’t need to know everything, and your characters can’t know everything.
10. Never make absolute statements.* If you make a hard rule early in the story, the odds are very high you’re going to have to break it.
11. Be consistent. All rules apply to all characters and all situations, that’s why they’re rules. If they don’t apply, there should be a reason.

What did you agree with? What did you disagree with? What rule do you think most applies to your own writing? Continue the discussion in the comments!

*There are some exceptions.

How do you write?

Picture designed by Freepik

This is something I’m always curious about learning from other writers, and it’s a good way to kick off this blog. When you sit down to write, what does your world look like? What’s your process? How does your story usually progress? Are you a plotter or a pantser? I don’t want to get too far into the pros and cons of outlining versus not–we can save that for a later post–but how do you do it, and why does it work for you?

For me, I have an office, and I’m writing on a desktop rather than a laptop. I can write on a laptop, but not comfortably or for an extended period of time. It used to be that I could only write at night, but somewhere along the line I got in the habit of writing first thing when I woke up on Saturday and Sunday, after some time sipping coffee and re-reading the previous session’s writing. Now I can write pretty much anytime if the inspiration is there.

I need music. I have soundtracks for every story I write and I’m always really excited when I find something new to add to it. The music either helps me with a scene in particular–I have some scenes that are actually choreographed to a particular song–or the general mood of the story. Music is not optional for me. I cannot write in silence.