Would you be willing to share world-building tips?
Maybe a resource you have found useful?
A questionnaire or a plan?
I want to create a general guideline or map of how the world in my story functions, something that I can refer to for the sake of continuity and logic across the plot, but the task just wears me down.
Dear Writer,
You've happened upon my hobby horse, so grab yourself some hot caffeine 'cause this’ll be a long one.
I find that this topic is best discussed in terms of core motivations vs. telling you to try X, Y, or Z. If you understand why you’re worldbuilding and what purpose it has in telling your story, you’ll be able to devote the proper amount of energy and time to it.
First, identify your guiding star.
The first and most crucial guiding star is that worldbuilding is a subset of storytelling.
You’re presumably writing a novel or series of novels. Your worldbuilding must support this goal of telling a really great story.
If your story is subsumed by your worldbuilding, you've lost your footing as an author. This is less about the work you as a writer do “under surface” of the water in the proverbial iceberg metaphor. It’s much more about what appears “above the surface” of your finished story.
If you spend a whole day doing worldbuidling and never add a single word to your novel's text, you’ve had a successful day of writing. What you’ve done on such a day is helped yourself understand what you’re trying to write.
When you return to the story proper, you’ll have more context, which’ll help expand your plotting possibilities and weave a more robust narrative.
Second, consider your big-picture worldbuilding philosophy.
There are two main ways of doing worldbuilding.
First, you could actually invent histories, languages, magic system, etc., and devote months or even longer just toward this content.
Some writers find that this is great story fodder because they have to adapt their ideas to the rules of the world, forcing them to be more creative than if they could change how the world works on a whim.
Alternatively, you could develop your worldbuilding contextually, expanding, constricting, or changing it as you go along. You begin with a few core ideas, write the story, and do your worldbuilding as the narrative unfolds, waiting for moments of inspiration or for key ideas to rear their heads before you grant them much attention.
Once again, it’s plotting vs. pantsing.
Brandon Sanderson has great insight into this, using the example of an iceberg. Typically, we say in storytelling and in worldbuilding that what the audience sees is just "the tip of the iceberg," and the bulk of the work is actually below the water's surface.
Sanderson says that whether or not we actually create the entire iceberg of worldbuilding, we must write in such a way that the audience believes there is an entire iceberg beneath the surface.
Sanderson does build the entire iceberg—somewhere around 400,000 words of worldbuilding for Mistborn, I think. I do not. Rather, I create the illusion of an entire iceberg, yet I am frequently complimented on the depth of my worldbuilding.
Because Sanderson is exactly right about this.
Third, choose and play the right cards.
When we look at everything we could possibly alter in our worldbuilding, it can be scary because our world is complex enough without making up another one.
Writers shouldn’t bog themselves down with every possible area in which something could potentially be different in the story world.
Unless told otherwise, your audience assumes coherence between our world and the story world. You don't need to put your characters in the bathroom to prove to your reader that pooping is a thing in your world.
Rather, choose a subset of things you really want to hone in on.
If it's a completely made-up world unconnected to Earth Prime, history will be important because your world's history will be totally unique. This doesn't mean your characters are always sitting around talking about history, but it does mean that they live in a world influenced by its history, and like a fish can't live outside of water, your story can't take place outside of its immediate context.
Consider that worldbuilding deals in three main disciplines:
The humanities (human concerns)
The sciences (how the universe or the world functions)
Metaphysics (supernatural stuff; usually magic systems will fall here)
Pick a couple of things from each of these disciplines to play with and don't worry about becoming an expert on everything under the sun.
Fourth, remember the reasons for worldbuilding.
There are three big reasons why anyone should bother worldbuilding.
These things aren’t peculiar to worldbuilding, but if the worldbuilding is done well, it’ll do these things.
First, to elicit curiosity.
Worldbuilding alters the limits of what we know as "real life." It adapts our expectations into something familiar but different; it uses objective lies to highlight existential truths.
This captures audience attention and makes them ask "why," and "why" is a question all authors, regardless of genre, want readers to ask.
The minute the reader shifts from "why?" to "who cares," you've lost your footing.
Second, to create coherence.
If the story takes itself seriously, readers will. Suspension of disbelief is indispensable in all fiction, but especially speculative fiction.
In World-Building, Stephen L. Gillette writes that worldbuilding, “...Imbues a sense of reality that can carry your reader along, that can elicit the willing suspension of disbelief almost unconsciously.”
A story has to coherently make sense.
Third, to broaden the possibilities for conflict.
Conflict is story fuel, and worldbuilding done well serves the purpose of inciting conflict by creating areas for conflict that might not exist in the real world.
Space travel in Star Wars not only lets people travel far and wide, but it creates a lot of conflict, usually involving stars and wars.
The magic in Harry Potter exists independently of conflict, yet it is also a source of conflict between the characters, especially as the metanarrative progresses.
Last but not least: Count the cost of worldbuilding.
It’s crucial to have your goal in mind.
Sanderson, I think, earned an MFA and a large portion of his master's thesis was doing the worldbuilding for Elantris. Unless you’re in some sort of a gravy train situation where you'll get a master's degree for doing worldbuilding, you have to count the cost.
How much work do you really need to do to write a great story?
It's just not feasible for most people to write 400,000 words of worldbuilding content when they’re not making a living writing, and I think that if you’re, on average, spending more time worldbuilding than actually writing your story, you've lost your footing.
In this case, you’re not storytelling, you’re worldbuilding.
I do think, though, that if you plan to write a long series, it can be beneficial to do a lot of worldbuilding because you'll be drawing from that well for a long time.
In that case, the sum total of the works you write on the basis of a large corpus of worldbuilding material could make the effort worth it.
But ultimately, it's up to you as the writer to know yourself and determine what the best proportion is for you to do the best work.
Resources
Brandon Sanderson has a great video on worldbuilding. YouTube it and you should find it right quick.
Story by Robert McKee isn't about worldbuidling per se, but belongs in your library. See his section on setting.
How to Write Science Fiction and Fantasy by Orson Scott Card is a bit dated by now, but there are some helpful insights within.
How to Invent Everything by Ryan North is a book that made a splash for a lot of worldbuilders.
D&D people know a lot about worldbuilding. Seek out their nerdy wisdom (attribute).
Worldbuilding can seem like a real bear and can be at times, but it's very rewarding for your stories if you can do it well and remain balanced.
Best,
DRM
DANIEL RODRIGUES-MARTIN is the author of books, articles, essays, poems, reviews, and countless rants since 2004. His debut novel, GODDESS FROM THE MACHINE, earned a Kirkus Star and is available from most major carriers.