Creating Worlds

By Catelfemma
Fantasy and sci-fi worlds come in all different shapes and sizes. This is an article to try and help you design yours.

Complexity
The first thing to remember is about complexity of the world. Im not going to go into too much detail because Writing
Short Stories and Writing Longer Tales articles will probably cover this.
Obviously, if the world comes entirely from your own imagination you will need to pay close attention to detail, but if
its partly based on history, you can probably rely on your reader to fill in any gaps you might leave. Often a fantasy
story is set in an alternative, fantasy world, which is fine if youre writing a novel, but if youre only writing a short
story, you dont want to start detailing the family tree of the entire royal family. (I use this as an example because Ive
done it myself. I was writing a story about a maid in the royal palace, Id reached about 500 words and I started
talking about the royal family. 700 boring words later I realised nobody wanted to hear this and deleted the lot.) Of
course, an author doesnt tell the reader everything he or she knows, so you could have your entire world designed in
your head and only use snippets for your story. This is just something to remember- this article will help you with your
world, but keep it to however much your reader needs to/wants to know.

Basics
Im going to start with the basics. An ideal fantasy/sci-fi world is a blend of the real and the abnormal. This is
important to keep in mind.
What does your world look like? Is it round? Is it flat? It could be a square- after all, this is fantasy. Do the people in
the world know that its flat/square/round? Have they discovered it all? Remember that we had only discovered and
accurately mapped the entire world (the continents being the right sizes and in proportion, no islands of a size worth
bothering about missing and so on) by the end of the nineteenth century.
Continents are always interesting. If your characters know what the continents look like, do they obey science and
continental drift? What about towns and cities? Where are they? Requirements for a city might be a river, fertile land
and temperate weather. I think its about time for me to recommend an article on Medieval Demography, which actually
covers a lot more. It can be found at . I dont know who wrote it, but I am eternally grateful to you, whoever you are.
This also makes me eternally grateful to the writer of Writing Longer Tales, which is where I found the hyperlink in the
first place. J While Im on the topic of useful websites, try http://www.seventhsanctum.com/www/index.html these are fifty-six
articles on Creating Worlds.
One thing to remember is stick to what you know. Youre inventing this world of the top of your head, yes, but dont
attempt to describe something youve never seen the like of. I live in rainy Britain, and I tried to write a story with a
Japanese sort of feel. I failed so dismally I felt quite pleased with how awfully the story had turned out. I didnt know
that I could write so plainly badly!

How to introduce elements of the world youve created

When a reader begins a book, they automatically assume that its set on Earth, in the present day. They will need
persuading that they are in fact in an alternative universe. Theres nothing worse than reading a book, getting to about
halfway through, when someone suddenly mentions King such-and-such, or the way theyre going to have trouble
navigating the spaceships around all the different moons.
Try introducing it early on. At the example at the end of this article, Singing is introduced at about the thirtieth word.
This depends on the length of your story, but its a good idea to at least drop hints about the time and place. Having
your character read a newspaper with the date on, for example. Anything like that would be fine. I dont intend to go
into detail on this, but your reader needs to know where they are. So, introduce your world. As I said before, keep it to
what your reader needs to know, but make sure your reader knows what they need to know and only what they need
to know. I once did a fantastic description of a city that I never intended my characters to visit. Actually, in the end I
was so proud of this city I couldnt bear not to use it, so my characters changed direction and went to the city instead.

People
Are they even people? This is more to do with characters than worlds, so I wont say much, but who and what they are
also affects your world. Do they live in harmony with the land, or are they very industrious? Or are they both? Is your
world polluted because of them? Or are they trying to change that? This is the real/unreal thing again- imagine you
have some giant, strange-gas-breathing insects. Now, most people will be able to picture something under insect, and
if you give the names of a few gases that could produce the particular compound they breath in (check with a scientist
on this one- you want to make sure you dont end up with an explosion, or those gases couldnt possibly form a
compound), then your reader will be able to imagine what youre on about. Dont use giant gas-breathing insects
though- theyre about the most unoriginal aliens after the little green men.
Magic/technology
Magic is for fantasy what technology is for sci-fi- basically they make possible in your story what isnt possible in real
life. This is where you can be really imaginative, unless you want your world to be realistic. This, of course, also
depends upon your idea of magic. Technology is easier. Presumably its going to be some future technology, and who
knows what that might be? It might be a good idea to do some scientific research to see what might be possible,
although this does depend who youre writing for. If its adults, its best to be reasonably accurate. Children however,
are unlikely to be able to tell if your science is accurate and may even prefer it if it isnt.
Magic can be anything. I would avoid magic wands like the plague- just a bit of advice. Magic as an elemental force can
be useful in creating worlds, though. Why hasnt the volcano exploded? Magic is keeping it under control. Any small
mistakes you might have made- you know that the island isnt there, oh, sugar, why isnt the island there? Oh, it was
magic. It took it away. Magic is wonderful for filling plot holes, just dont overuse it. Technology can work in a similar
way, but its a general assumption that technology would only be made to benefit. So if its of no benefit to anyone that
the island is continually moving, there would need to be a reason for it. A computer virus will always do. How come the
islands still moving? Oh, well, it was an experiment, and they tried to stop it and the virus shut down their control.
Well. It might work

Language
Language is an important factor. A kingdom will probably have several different languages, or if not, at least a variety
of dialects of the same language. Since Tolkien, theres been pressure on fantasy writers to make up your own, unique
language. Obviously the odd word here or there is easy to invent, but you need to have quite a good grasp of language
structure and how it could be altered before attempting to write your own language. Its useful to speak two or more
languages doing this, because that way you can blend words from those languages. Include a translation, especially if
youre doing this on Elfwood, but also because, as a reader, if there are a lot of words constantly used in a story, I find
myself forgetting what they mean. A translation might have been provided the first time they said it, but later on it
isnt, so a quick word list at the end is always very helpful. If you provide a translation, the reader knows that you are
reusing words and terms, like you would in a real language, so that they get the impression that theres some structure
to it.
It does depend how much you use your invented language. As little as possible is always good advice, unless youre
very confident about it. The odd word, especially when a character isnt supposed to know what it means, can just be
left, but if you intend to write half the storywell, all I can say is that I wish you luck.

Government
What sort of rulers does your world have? Are they democratic? Is there a monarch? Or do priests, or warlords rule
countries? This is something thats either very important to your story (rightful king returning to power/ evil lord
overthrown) or barely worth a mention (oh yeah, theres a king- what does he matter, I want to slay this dragon!)
Obviously this also depends on the time period and so on.
Id like to suggest a few governments that I dont think have been useful in fantasy or sci-fi before.
Myriarchy- Government by 10,000 people
Angelocracy- Government by angels
Diabolarchy- Government by devils
Neocracy- Government by amateurs
Paedarchy- Government by a child or children

History
Of course, one of the most important things about a world is its history. Has it developed the same way our world has?
Is it just our world in the future? Ill quote Red Dwarf here- the Cat civilization invented- erm, I think it was a trouser
press- as the pivotal invention of their civilization, like ours was the wheel. Now, obviously this is humour, but its an
important thing to keep in mind, although makes sure you know how they evolved differently, rather than just saying
differently.
How old is the world? Is your story set right at the beginning of time? Or right at the end of it? Keeping your story
consistent with real history can be a good idea, simply so you dont confuse your reader. If you are in castles, assume
cannon havent been invented yet- it is unbelievable how many books slip up on that one. Castles are no use if cannon
can destroy them! If in your far-distant future, you have instantaneous transportation to anywhere you might possibly
want to go, border guards are pointless. Im not sure thats really to do with history, but whatever, its an important
point to remember.
If your sci-fi world is just our world in the future, be careful! A for Andromeda by Fred Hoyle is about a message from
space with instructions on how to create a life form. This is set in the 1950s. Obviously its funny for us now, butwell.
What Im trying to say is do you best to predict the future as accurately as you can, and depending on how advance
you want society to be, choose your point in time carefully!
Religion
If you want your world to be realistic, your people will probably have a religion of some sort. Now, you can more or
less create this from your imagination by asking yourself a number of questions about it- monotheism or polytheism?
Tolerant or intolerant of other religions? What are their churches like? Are most people religions?- and so on. This is
something to be very careful on though- if your religion is too similar to another world religion, you could very easily
offend vast numbers of people- not a good idea.
That said, religion does add a lot of realism to your story, and can be useful if you dont allow it to dominate. Well. The
choice is up to you.

My sample world
Well, Ive been blabbering on about how you could create a world- remember, mix reality and invention- but I havent
given any examples. So, heres a description of a world Im using for a story at the moment.
Arlon: Its a feudal society. Its set in a medieval sort of time period, in about the 1200s. (Yes, very unoriginal, I know,
but it makes everything so much easier!) There is magic in the country of Arlon, called Singing. There is Dark Singing
and Land Singing. Dark Singing is very powerful and evil and there is the possibility to do almost anything using it. A
Dark Singer is born with the ability to hum, sing or even just tap out a rhythm and put into it a spell. Land Singing is
good magic, but Land Singing is far more limited than Dark Singing. Land Singing can be healing magic, or love spells,
or weather magic.
Arlon is a small kingdom, which is basically confined to one large valley, surrounded by the highest mountains in the
world. Barely anybody who lives in Arlon has ever been out of it- and barely anyone who lives outside Arlon has ever
gone in. The mountains are easy to cross for about two weeks in the summer, but to travel over them takes three
weeks, so barely anybody tries it. If you dont set off within those two weeks- well, more than half the people who
attempt it dont make it. The outside world isnt even mentioned within Arlon, because its so distant. Arlon is made up
of small villages, with only one largish town, which is the capital city. No village is more than a kilometre from another
villages.
Anyway, I hope this article has been helpful!