Hey Writer Person

Hey Writer Person 🖋 - Building Worlds

Hey Writer Person,

Really!?!? We haven't talked world building yet!?! Its easily my favourite part of writing a story.

Ok, so here we go:

Its important to say, there's no right or wrong way to do this. Whatever you need to do to feel comfortable that you know enough of your world to write it confidently, then that's all you need. But I do find more is better. It's hard to overdo it. The reader may never see it all, or know how much work you did behind the scenes (in fact, they definitely won't), but they'll know they really bought into the world, really believed it, and that's because of the world building. The more you develop of the world, the richer the story becomes.

So how to do that. When you have to build an entire world/universe that's different from our own -- where do you start?

Before I get into it, I want to say right out the gate: world building is not just making up nonsense. Yes, technically you are making stuff up, but everything you make up has to have rules/fit into the framework of the world. For example, say I've written a superhero story where a made up mineral (let's call it migicerillium!) is what gives them super powers. How does magicerillium behave as a mineral? I cant just say look, magic rock! I mean, I can, but that's not very convincing. Its probably worth doing some research on different kinds of minerals (does magicerillium come from space? What are the rocks like that we've already studied from space? Magicerillium is from earth? How come we haven't discovered it before this story? What minerals that exist in real life could inspire properties of magicerillium? i.e., magnetism or radiation etc etc. Real life info makes the magic more believable. Research research research!)

Ok so where to start. I like to start at my main conflict. I usually come up witj a conflict before anything. A character facing a problem. And thats all I need to start building. So for example, my current Work In Progress has this for the conflict: Sister princesses find themselves on the run with the royal family's war bear when their traitorous uncle dethrones their father, the king.

That is a very very basic summary of the main problem in this story. And it's enough to start building the world.

War Bears are awesome. But now I have to ask myself: why does this royal family have War Bears? I'm going to go ahead and say it's because of their religion. Ok, but what is that religion? Now I have to make one up (with research)

What is the origin of this religion? What's it's most basic belief? Why bears? Do they only worship war Bears or other animals too? 

How is the religion structured? Are there faith leaders of some kind, like priests? Is the king a part of their faith or seperate from it? Do they worship in some kind of building, like churches? Or is it more home based, with shrines around the hearth? 

World building is basically asking myself all of the questions there are/could be about this place and time.

Based on my central conflict, I also know there's a problem between a king and his brother. So now I need to get into the politics of this world.

- What is the king a king OF? What is this kingdom? Are there kingdom structures in real world history that might help inform my world? How is the king chosen? Who succeeds him? Is their war bear religion involved in that? (Spoiler alert: yes, big time). Where do princesses fit into the line of succession? 

And from the questions inspired by my main conflict, a world spiders out, more questions leading to answers leading to questions!

Lets look at some big worlds. How about The Matrix? Lets start at the central conflict:

Humanity is trapped in a virtual reality by sentient machines and its up to one guy to save them all

So lets start asking questions! why are the machines trapping ppl in virtual reality? (Human batteries) Where did these machines even come from? (Ppl made them) For what? (Make life easier) How'd it spiral so out control? (A war - here you can head down the war road and ask all kinds of questions about the history of that war) If ppl are living in a virtual reality, how are new ppl born in real life? (Machines grow them!) How do machines grow them? (Genetically i guess! Probably have to do some research!) What's life inside the Matrix like? (Like real life! But its a computer program! Should probably read up on virtual reality). Who's this one guy who's supposed to save them? (Neo!) What makes him so special? (Chosen one!) But why is he chosen? (I dunno, keanu-ness? There's a faith system here, not quite a religion but definitely a prophecy. What do ppl in this world beleive in?) How will Neo get out of the matrix? (Ppl pull him out!) Well how'd THEY get out? (Other ppl pulled them out, back and back to a whole history of the rebellion against the machines). Whats it like to come out of the matrix? (Well they've been living in a vegetative state in a goopy bed so theres a lot that happens to the body living that way. Should probably do some research)

You don't have to be able to answer every question there could ever be about your world, but asking yourself as many questions as you can really helps to enrich the landscape you are creating. And even if you can't answer some of the questions that present themselves, you may find while writing that you end up coming up with the answers you need organically. When you do, go back to your world building document and make a note. Having a document or "story bible" with notes about the world that I can refer to really helps me keep track of all my ideas and keep the world consistent.

So open a fresh word document, Writer Person,  and get asking questions. See what you can build!