On the Subject of Worlbuilding

Good worldbuilding is critical to almost any piece of fiction, but it is also one of- if not the- most difficult part of writing. How can you honestly be expected to come up with entire cities, geography, people, factions, backstories for it all, rumors, secrets, inventions, weathers patterns, social structures, cultures, and everything else that comes with a living-breathing world while writing the an already difficult plot? The answer: you can’t.

All too often I see good authors try to worldbuild while building the plot. 9/10 times they give up in the first week. It is almost impossible to do both at once; so don’t. Instead, come up with as much of the world as you can before you begin thinking about your plot. Come up with a settlement here, a faction there, a small family story, a royal history, a mountain, a sandcastle; if you keep picking at the world little by little then eventually you will have a living, breathing world in front of you. At this point, when you have a place for the characters to inhabit and interact with, then you can start the plot. This is not a quick process however. As the saying goes: “Rome wasn’t built in a day!” It can take authors years sometimes to build their world, but the key thing to keep in mind is not to try and do it all in one caffeine-fueled night. If you just do a little-bit at a time, then you’ll go far.