Everything You Need to Build a World
By: Andrea Turrentine
Tags: Fiction, Writing Tips, Fiction Writing, Witcher, Worldbuilding

Johannes Plenio on Unsplash

Introduction

Neverland. Azeroth. Earthsea. The Unnamed Land. Oz. Westeros. End World. The Continent. Middle Earth.

My deepest thank you to their respective creators.

In their unique styles, each of these places exist in the hearts and minds of the readers, watchers and players across the globe. A collective consciousness almost like a hive sparks recognition. White Walker. Aslan. Rivendell. Witcher.

The fantasy genre is simply my preference to scratch into first. This guide will center on the fantasy genre. All fiction genres occur in a world that we want to become real to our readers. I implore you to scratch the pages of any work whose world resonates through you.

The Fantasy Genre

Tolkien set the bar high.

Sky high. Tolkien is a good example because he is inarguably a master world builder. Tolkien regarded Middle Earth, the setting for the Lord of the Rings, as its own charcter. The details were intricate. The lore of Middle Earth is without depth. Various races. Nuances fill every page.

Heavily influenced by his Judeo-Christian faith, Tolkien’s world posses a creation story, a corruption story, the birth of races story all the way down to a single man happened upon by Frodo and his band. A mysterious care free man with no beginning or end. Tom Bombadil. His own Melchizedek.

1. Make Your Over Arching World Rules

Every civilization has a collection of standards as their own form of law. If you are stumped about what kind of world to build in a story, study history. Humans, most humans, don’t enjoy being lied to. Worlds need to have concrete things about them. The firmness of your world is what grips the reader.

Verisimilitude — the appearance of being true or real. — Oxford Languages

Most people do not enjoy a story where no stakes exist. There must be consequences. Most readers want to know that what happens in the story matters.

How to achieve verisimilitude?

Verisimilitude is achieved by the observance of the world’s rules. The characters function and live in the firmness of the world. Think about your favorite fantasy characters. Are they shaped by their world? Does their profile change once you set them in the world? If we are going to move our characters around the world without regard to it, then those parts of the world should not exist in our story.

How History Helps Writers

Sometimes we hear people say, you can’t make this stuff up. The fortunate thing about writing fantasy novels is we don’t have to look far for inspiration. A famous book says there’s nothing new under the sun.

4 Tips on How to Use History to Build Your World

Decide the era in human history that most resembles your story. Most of think of Medieval times. Why is that? I’m not sure. I think of it because it is a strange intersection of religion and fantastic beliefs. The ancient worlds of Greece and Rome are stand outs. The presence of gods and monsters is always a nice touch to a fantastic world. Keeps things spicy. You can use history to create a skeleton for your world. Your imagination will build fantastic, other worldly elements on top of it. What are the political groups of the time? What is the structure of society? Were they capitalists? Did they live in communal settings? Choose geographical regions that you want as settings in your story. You can choose a real country and investigate how life developed in that era over time. The actual history of civilization in the region can serve as inspiration for your tale. In your fantasy world building, you can use the perils, unique landscapes and climates of real places as a backdrop of the world. Look at the arts of that time period. Examine how people express themselves in the arts of that time. What methods did they use? Who participated in the arts? Were the arts celebrated? Studying the arts of that era can provide inspiration for fleshing out the particulars in your world. You may even meet new characters in your study. Examine the significant events. What were the significant events in that time and place. Was it a flood? Could it have been a famine? Was there a birth of triplets? Anyone burned at the stake? Checking out significant events in history let’s you see what people considered important. Think about what is important to the various people groups in your world.

2. The World Origins Must have Significance

I think every writer should take interest in history. Likewise, the history of your fantasy world should directly impact its present. The writer should consider if its characters will allow the flow of time to carry the world in its due course. Will the characters impact the world that its course will be changed?

In the world of Sapkowski’s The Witcher, there is the Conjunction of the Spheres, a magical cataclysm. Similarly, Martin’s A Song of Ice and Fire Westeros, there is The Doom of Valyria as a great world changing disaster. Interestingly, an icy doom looms over them both. Climate change, y’all.

In King’s Gunslinger Saga: The Dark Tower, it is heavily implied that was a nuclear disaster. I can’t recall if LeMerc Industries took the blame for that.

Consider what things have occurred in the history of your fantasy world. What significant events occurred to shaped the world your characters live in? How are the people groups impacted by those events?

You have to decide in order to provide concreteness to your world. If you want a world of three dimensions, you have to create a firm history. Past events can provide a deep rooted motivation for your characters. Don’t neglect history.

3. Draw Political Lines and Factions

Politics may be out of bounds conversation in most social settings for obvious reasons. However, neglecting politics in your fantasy world building could be a huge error. There’s so many juicy political dramas in the past. This is the perfect world building fodder, y’all. Consult the aforementioned fantasy legends.

As you create your fantasy novel, you should consider the political leanings of the people groups that exist in your world. Don’t ignore politics, in this case. You can’t build a world without people within it. All people have a political stance, even it is to be apolitical.

For example, it is widely known that George RR Martin took inspiration for the Starks and Lannisters from the War of the Roses. A real political struggle between noble families, the Yorks and the Lancasters of England.

I had the pleasure of taking Margaret Atwood’s creative writing course in Master Class. She stated that everything that occurs in A Handmaid’s Tale has happened in our human history.

Her rule for her world is that it must have already happened. So the horrors, all the horrors, found in those books are things humans have already done.

Have you read anything by Martin or Atwood? If you haven’t, what are you even doing? Stop reading this and go read them. I’ll wait.

4. Create Belief Systems

Octavia Butler. Ever read, Butler? No. Go do that. I’ll wait still.

Science-fiction, strong heroines and tangible worlds are your thing, you NEED her writings in your life. The Lilith’s Brood saga paints the world through the eyes of a woman who stood apart from the religious beliefs she once had.

I don’t want to spoil the books for you. So, I will say that the religious origins of the world naturally do not have to be the beliefs of your character.

In fact, Butler’s heroine’s shift away from religion that marked her apart from her human counterparts. It hinges the story in such a way that it’s of consequence.

Moreover, in A Song of Ice and Fire by George RR Martin, there are competing religions of the Old Ways of the North and the Light of the Seven in the South and the Many Faced God in Bravos and the other deities worshipped there. A great deal of the story is set upon these factions.

Tangible worlds are worlds that are familiar. What people believe and how they observe those beliefs impact the world. It creates depth, conflicts, characters and wants. Interestingly, a story of a world without religion is equally compelling. What do those who want to believe do with their need for faith?

For firm, tangible, fictional worlds, this writer’s amateur opinion is: belief systems are a must. You score bonus drama points if the political and religious beliefs are slapped atop each other in an orgy of rhetoric. (Don’t forget the sex.)

History teaches us that beliefs and their systems create opportunities for conflict, drama and endless stories.

5. Have Different Kinds of People

C.S. Lewis created Narnia was a world accessed through a wardrobe. It had all kinds of sentient beings from humans, to talking animals, to mythical creatures like fauns and centaurs. J. K. Rowling’s Harry Potter boasts Muggles, Wizards, Witches, Squibs and Half-bloods!

Those are just the humans! Stephen King’s Universe….whoa baby…hold on…this world is massive…you have those with the Shine…you have Gunslingers, mutants, Taheen, and those born from the Crimson King. Not to mention those cosmic giants like the Great Turtle Maturin and the creature Pennywise.

Not to beat you over the head with A Song of Ice and Fire…

It bears highlighting various people groups that are on every page in the saga. They are all consequential to the world and the character journeys. Making differences for the purpose of drama.

3 World building People Group Tips

Invaders or Voyagers? — Lifestyles can separate so fundamentally that a whole story could be crafted around it. People groups migrate from one land to the other usually to find lands more hospitable. People groups already living on those lands could respond to nomads with hospitality or hostility. Consider your people groups and how might other people groups in the world regard them? There is a wonderful opportunity to develop characters and stories there. Opposing Ideology — whenever you have a character that wants to fight an established belief system, there is promised conflict. Conflict equals drama. There is no drama without conflict. The protagonist could have opposing ideology within themselves. It doesn’t have to be religion. It could be a belief about sex, money, age, or physical ability. Concrete Power Structures — I never understood why the Weasley’s were poor. They were pure blooded magicians, but somehow…they were poor. I never understood that. There are all kinds of explanations out there but none sit right with me. I always thought the more compelling aspect would have been the pureblood having access to greater amounts of magic. Pure blood didn’t really have a lot of consequence since Hermione and Harry could cast circles around Ron, their pure blooded friend.

6. Establish Connections between the Peoples and the Environment

There were no out of shape ancient Spartans.

Sparta wouldn’t allow you to be out of shape.

Moreover, Sparta forbade allow you to be alive if you couldn’t survive exposure as an infant. I don’t know how true that is, but so the legend goes. Spartan belief systems in the ancient world demanded physical conditioning. War was always on their mind because it was the state of the world.

When you build a world, if people live near a body of water it will be significant to them. They will most likely swim it. They may even worship it. There could be festivals around it. The calendar of the people may have holy days regarding it. Don’t neglect the particulars of the terrain.

Therefore, all natural land structures can serve you as inspiration to craft amazing locations in your story. How many are there? Mountains. Waterfalls. Quick sand. Deserts. Valleys. Canyons. Volcanoes. Whirlpools. Chasms. Rivers. Bogs. Swamps. Oases. A result of careful examination of our world can inspire endless foundations for your fantasy world.

Write on, y’all.