WIP Special Part 2 of 5 || this is when I wish I spent more time on worldbuilding

*frantic typing at 10pm*

So I knew this post was coming. And I should have planned ahead. But hey, what's life for if not last-minute panic? And mentally kicking yourself? because this post is about worldbuilding and yours is nonexistant?

Welcome to -

(Thanks to Lila for making the awesome graphic! <3)

The March 5-Part Special

Part 2: World and Setting

–{{What would we immediately notice upon stepping into your storyworld? (What would stand out the most?)

Oookay.

...I have decided to skip this week's post.

Most of my story is set in a house (of some sort) that's in a forest (of a cliche sort)?? My storyworld is rather thin?? I'm focused on the characters, okay.

Also where exactly are you stepping into my storyworld? If you arrived in the capital city, which would probably be a good spot for tourists to start at, you might notice that it's very elegant and has lots of white stone buildings. If you were in the three sisters' cottage, you'd notice the log walls' rough edges and gouges from inexperienced hands, but also the colourful braided rug and the unevenly dyed green curtains. (And probably two pairs of muddy boots left haphazardly by the door. That's Josie and Billie.)

If you were in the forest, though, you'd notice... trees. Lots of trees. Some narrow trails, worn down to dust; a lot of bird activity high in the treetops. You would not notice the bandits, because they're hiding.

Side note: As a companion to this post, maybe go read my post on settings from the last 4-Part Special, okay? I started it basically the same way... by threatening to leave... Reading back over it, the thing I'm most noticing is that I recognised that I needed more worldbuilding... and almost five months later, I've barely added a thing. Regardless of that - or perhaps because of it - that post is still very relevant. In fact, you can read the whole series here!

The Four-Part Writing Special // Part Three: Story World

And thus, another Wednesday.





Never mind that it's actually Thursday morning here. Due to time zones, it shouldn't be too obvious. Hopefully.


This whole "schedule" thing... it's actually quite good for me, if I admit it. Not only does it mean I post at least once a week, but it means I stay up late on Tuesday nights stressing! Typing and backspacing and typing and grimacing and slapping my laptop. That's basically what I'd be doing anyway, so I might as well get something productive out of it.

(This is in no way an admission that I need a blogging schedule. I'm a pantser.)

You can find Part One here, Part Two here, and now - Story World: Part Three of the 4-Part Writing Special! 

1. Name a unique aspect of your story world.

...

Well, this post didn't last long. *leaves*

...

I'm a pantser, okay?? That means I set stuff up when I need it.

So far, the setting has been: the forest (Ranwood); a small town just outside Ranwood; and the Beast's manor-house-thing inside Ranwood. I haven't even named the country or its capital - but I am feeling the results of that now.

I HAVEN'T SET UP MY WORLDBUILDINGUP. I ADMIT IT.

Probably the most unique aspect of my story world is that, for fantasy, it's a later-feeling time period? Almost Edwardian, maybe?? (Or Victorian, or Georgian... I wouldn't know.) More like ferns in white conservatories, a cottage rough grey wood and checked curtains, high arched ceilings in halls full of white pillars.

...Actually, I found a few pictures which fit the capital, if that helps:

2. Talk about one of the important animals in the story (someone's pet or horse; or a fierce animal the MC must defeat).

Old Bill is a very important part of set-up at the start of the story. Billie would love to have the use of him for doing the heavy work around the house, but she won't ask. So Josie claimed him (without considering) and has used him to ride around the forest hunting and being dramatic.

(I should mention: I did not copy Bill the bony old pony off Tolkien??)

Another important animal which was present for like 2 pages but played an important role is a dog. It doesn't have a name, but it has a good nose. Jemma went and got it so she + Zephyr + his men could track down where Elsie'd gone when she ran. So. Thanks for snitching, slobbery dog.

[That last sentence was Billie. Just so you know.]

3. A paragraph describing something in your storyworld (building, landmark, etc.).

The Beast's home/manor? is the biggest feature at the moment. (Apart from Ranwood forest. But it's just your standard cliche fantasy forest. With bandits in it.) I had to find a floor plan for it before I could write - because I'm terrible at visualising settings - and you can see that floor plan HERE.

That's a modern 'manor', of course, but I've scribbled on my copy to turn it back into a fantasy building. (The Beast, for example, probably does not need a three-car garage. It can be a mini-museum or something. Also the 'lanai' verandah has been changed into a conservatory.)

Like that, but not quite. But this is the closest picture I can find. More ferns would be good.

4. Something dangerous in your storyworld.

The Beast has the potential to be quite dangerous. (Especially if you hurt his tea. Or ferns. Or china.)

I mean, my Beast doesn't have an eyepatch... but close enough. :P

(He counts as part of the storyworld, right??)

There are bandits in Ranwood forest. They are SUPER DANGEROUS. *cough* actually they're all just big softies. And goofs, sometimes.

But... I think Mrs Potts could be dangerous! She's a ball of glowing light, but capable of handling physical objects. Such as saucepans. Which she briefly attacked the bandits with [except that's the scene I'm still on, so I don't know how it plays out...]. Anyway. She doesn't like Billie - who keeps smashing stuff and making Count Laszlo anxious - so she could certainly be dangerous.

Otherwise, the villain. Who... I haven't developed yet. (I'm starting to see a theme here??)

5. Something delightful in your storyworld.

Rowan. Also Zephyr. 

I CAN COUNT PEOPLE AS DELIGHTFUL THINGS FROM MY STORYWORLD IF I WANT. (And I do.) It's my story. *grumpy face* And I say ROWAN AND ZEPHYR but don't make me pick.

I also find Elsie + Zephyr delightful and completely squishable.

...if you want actual storyworld answers, I'm trying to play with features that wouldn't be the first thing you think of when you think "fantasy". Like the rather period English conservatory. Or the tea + china + scones. Or the entire aesthetic of the Beast's manor. Personally, I find it delightful.

6. A movie soundtrack that would complement the setting.

I don't know.

It's only recently that I've started listening to music while I write. And I don't watch many movies (comparatively). And Marvel soundtracks would hardly fit anyway, and Middle-Earth soundtracks are a bit high-fantasy (also I don't want to be cliche), and I need to find my story a soundtrack but I haven't yet.

Although I do have a few I found for a few dramatic/feelsy scenes. They aren't from a soundtrack, though.

Two Steps From Hell: 

Clair Voyant || Sky Titans (a bit too "epic" to fit perfectly, though)

Alexandra Streliski: 

Bourrasques || Le Sablier

(I was trying to write some painful/feelsy dialogue and put these two, with a few of her other songs, on repeat.)

Helen Jane Long: 

Storm Away

7. How does the geography impact the story?

Ranwood forest plays a big role - "cliche fantasy forest" is a hard thing to live up to! At the moment, it impacts the plot mostly by exacerbating the sisters' problems. For example, their cottage was damaged by the Beast, so Elsie and Josie will struggle to get through winter without Billie to fix it. (See the next point for a further note on the winter thing.) Apart from that, the bandits live in it, which impacts the story because I get 143% more words when the bandits are there providing sass.

8. Is there a particular location or time period your story you had in mind when creating your storyworld?

Just your standard northern-hemisphere forest... *rolls eyes* (I'm thinking I'll maybe change it to more of an Australian-inspired forest? I'm sure we have some good features for worldbuilding somewhere... I like the idea of fire being the danger, instead of snow/cold [which we do get in some parts of Australia, but I have basically zero experience with].)

As for time period, it probably feels later than a lot of fantasy. I haven't picked a specific era, but various elements are semi-modern (as in, not medieval? I guess that's what I'm trying to say??)

For example, my storyworld has teacups (not sure if the whole tea/coffee thing is going to stay in, but at the moment I'm having great fun playing with it - although I haven't used the words "tea" or "coffee"). It has high-roofed halls of white stone and libraries full of books. I feel like I'm trying to get an almost Victorian whimsy in?? but it wasn't meant to be modern (still pre-Industrial Revolution, for example).

Probably the easiest way to get a feel for the time period would be to look at the pictures from the first question. Because despite being a writer I still don't know how to word, apparently.

9. What is the climate like, and does it play a role in the story?

The climate is your standard sort of... I don't  know... There's snow in winter?? (which is bizarre because I've never experienced snowfall) (and don't have snow myself)

BASICALLY, go back and read questions 8 + 9 again because I think I covered everything I know (it isn't much) in those ones.

10. Are there any traditions, and do they have an effect upon the plot? 

There is an important tradition/lore/ancient legend thing. It says that any offer to pay another's debt must be honoured. Even if that debt is a life. And in that case, you cannot harm either the one who owed the debt, or the one who offered to pay it.

So now the Beast has a girl living in his house and smashing his china.

He doesn't like it, for the above-mentioned reasons, and she doesn't like it, because she hates being useless and unable to rely on her own strength. (Also she's watching Elsie and Josie mess things up through the fantasy/book equivalent of a camera installed in their cottage.)

But she can't leave, because then the debt would be un-paid. So she takes out her feelings on the china. Which I think I already mentioned.

But yes, that's one tradition that strongly affects the plot. 


There you go! You now have a confession - in writing - of my deplorable lack of worldbuilding. Do you have any tips? How much worldbuilding do you do - and how much of it do you use? Do you plot or pants your worldbuilding? What's the most unique feature of your storyworld? What bit of worldbuilding are you most proud of? Any special traditions?


And don't forget to check out the posts from the other participating bloggers! Which I will link here when my eyes are doing better at staying open! or never. I might forget. I'll try not to.

Julian || Sarah || Ivie || Lisa || Faith || Lila || Evangeline

About character journaling (as promised)

A few people asked for a post on character journaling when I mentioned it a while back. Since it's just something I do - I think I got the idea from a GoTeenWriters post?? - I decided to do some research so I'd have a little more knowledge [before I pretended to talk about it like I actually knew].

Turns out I don't do character journaling?

Google won't define any of these terms for me (I'm ashamed of you, Google), and keeps giving me results about journaling's health benefits for your personal character, but as far as I can tell these seem to be the meanings of various terms:

Character journaling: Keeping a diary as your character.
Character interview: Pretending you're sitting opposite your character and asking them questions.
Character questionnaire: Hair/eye colour, family members, age, all that important and yet really boring stuff.
Voice journaling: Ask a question every so often, and your character answers it and just continues in a stream-of-consciousness sort of thing?

I find the questions in questionnaires (and possibly interviews, depending) good to know the answers to, but not useful for finding a character's personality. Is there a reason blue is his favourite colour? It's possible - but personally, I don't have a favourite colour or a reason behind that. And character journaling might be a good way to find out about your character, but I don't have the motivation or patience to write a whole book just to find out that my main character actually doesn't like all the travelling they've been doing, because of their insecurity and that one thing that happened (involving their family) when they were small. Or some such detail.

For investigating a character's personality, I use what one source called 'voice journaling'. [Seems like a cross between interviewing and journaling??]

I get a piece of paper and write a question at the top. "What's your relationship with your mother?" is a handy one, despite my cringing every time I use it ("So tell me about your mother!"). I have dug up so much family/political dirt with this one. (In my excuse, I was interviewing various members of a scheming royal family, so it was relevant.) Once 'the character' starts answering, I try not to overthink, but to keep writing and go with the flow - wherever feels right. Sometimes what comes out will clash with a previously-thought-out background detail, but I usually find I like the new version better. Other times, I simply get more ideas for rounding out the character.

Here's my standard list: 
*spends half an hour trying to find list in mountains of paper*
*possibly a sign I've been procrastinating writing for too long??*

• What's your relationship with your mother/father like?
• Who was your first love? 
• What do you think about [Character B]? [good for getting an insight into your main character from a fresh pair of eyes, or exploring a supporting character further.]
• What is your greatest fear? 
• What is the trait you most deplore [in yourself/others]?
• Which living person do you most admire?[interesting in a fantasy world... requires thought into worldbuilding! Is it an author? A scientist/inventor?? An athlete???] 
• What do you dislike most about your appearance?
• What quality do you admire most in a man? In a woman? 
• What is your greatest achievement? 
• What is your greatest regret? 
• How would you like to die? [this actually sounds a bit ominous?? especially coming from the author??]
• What is your motto? 
• What is the most evil thing you've ever done? 
• Who or what would you die for? [I use this one a lot.]
• Do you like yourself? 
• What is your responsibility to the world? 
• Is it acceptable for you to cry? 

These are my favourites I copied off a bigger list somewhere. I have the memory of someone living in a house full of nesting Silence and have no idea where. 

I use them like so:

Who or what would you die for?

In a professional sense, my job is literally to die for Torr [country] or Queen Melanie, if dying is called for. As Double Sir Benjamin Doyle, personal guard to Her Majesty Queen Melanie, and a knight of Torr, I defend them both with my life; and if ever there is a situation where either the queen or I must die, Torr or I must fall, by my honour I will gladly die. And if they are ever in danger, it is my duty to place myself between them and the sword. In a personal sense, on the other hand, I am very fond of Ma and my  adopted sister. For them I would do a lot; but I'm not sure if I could die for them. If they were in mortal danger I certainly would rather die in their place, but the problem is, I can only die once. As long as I'm fighting I can protect everyone, but when I come to die, I can only do it once and then I'm gone. And I have a responsibility to Torr and Queen Melanie, and I don't fully trust anyone else to replace me. Especially not as Melanie's guard. No one understands her like I do. May I never be in a situation where I have to choose. I know I must place my loyalty with queen and country. However, if some blackhearts had a knife to Ma's throat and had refused all negotiations and offers of duels, demanding that I surrender and be killed in exchange for her life, I can't imagine saying, "Sorry, Ma," and walking off. Or with Lyndie [adopted sister] either. I suspect that - unlike in theory - I would die for whichever of the four might need me first. And another problem is that once I've been killed, I can't defend them any longer, or make sure the killers don't just slit their throats as soon as I'm out of the way. I suppose the cause of that problem is that I have an extremely limited number of people I trust - and they're the ones I'd die to protect.

[I'm sure that was an annoying large chunk of we-don't-really-care text. Sorry. This WIP is my baby - first serious novel (and still not finished O.O) - and Benny is one of my favourite characters. I like him better than the MC, actually...]

In this instance, I discovered something I could use in my plot: conflicting loyalties for a man whose life was to protect others, but didn't trust anyone else to do his job.



My characters often take the questions different ways. They lie, redirect, gloss over the truth, avoid the question, deliberately misinterpret the question, typically start by asking what business it is of mine anyway... and talk for a whole page. I discover new things about their personalities and backstories, who they love and who they hate. Villains typically do the evil gloat thing and then threaten me. One of my favourite characters (not the villain) threatened me too, actually, but it was on someone else's behalf, which shed a bit more light on his relationship/history with her. Another started his answer to "Who was your first love?" with "My first love is [his country] (I willfully misunderstand your question)"; he emphasized his loyalty/duty, but moved from that to his upcoming arranged marriage, showing that his mind was, in fact, on his first love [hint hint he's starting to suspect it's someone he's not supposed to be in love with. surprise.]

There are a few similar questions here at Gotham Writers - some the same as mine, some a little more questionnaire-y in feel. (Completely irrelevantly, I have no idea why you would call yourself Gotham Writers, but it sounds... brooding.) And the article I read about voice journaling is here - the extract from The Art of War for Writers by James Scott Bell is good.

Do you question your characters? Do they always cooperate and answer your questions properly, or do they lie and/or talk about something else? Have you ever been threatened by your characters?? I hope this was helpful!

p.s. is it journaling or journalling?? spell-check doesn't like either? not that I'm relying on the spell-check, of course...

A few randomish facts that might spark a worldbuilding idea

I like to collect random facts and annoy my family with them. 

Me: Mum, did you know that in 1879 a city in Belgium [Liège, to be exact] trained 37 cats to deliver mail to surrounding villages?

Mum: They did not. 

Me: They did! 

Mum: Cats? They trained cats? 

Me: ...

Me: Well they commissioned 37 cats. 

Me: It didn't work. 

Me: You already guessed that, didn't you. Because cats.

But some of the facts I've found could be useful for worldbuilding or various happenings in your stories, so I thought I'd share a few. 

(These have all been collected from '1339 QI Facts to Make Your Jaw Drop'. Interesting book - but crude in spots. Read at your own risk.)

‘Journey’ is from French journée and once meant the distance one could walk in a day.

In Tibet, distances were traditionally measured by the number of cups of tea needed for each journey.
All the mountains on Saturn’s moon Titan are named after peaks in The Lord of the Rings.

Thailand has a special language used exclusively for talking to the king.

In the USA, ransom payments to kidnappers are tax-deductable. 

No more than two flies are allowed by law in any public toilet in China.

Public applause is banned in Belarus.

The Andorran army is made up of ten soldiers. 

 In Kennesaw, Georgia, gun ownership is required by law.

Entrance to the Tower of London used to be free if you brought a dog or cat to feed to the lions.

The Kattenstoet was a medieval festival in Belgium in which cats were thrown from the town’s belfry.

Villages in County Durham include Pity Me and No Place. 

Portsmouth has a locksmith called ‘Surelock Homes’.
The British Standards Institution has a 5,000 word report on the correct way to make a cup of tea.
Only 22 of the world’s 193 countries have never been invaded by the British.

In WW1, it was patriotic in the UK to kick dachshunds. 

There are 300 lakes beneath Antarctica that are kept from freezing by the warmth of the Earth’s core.
The ancient city of Alexandria was built in such a way that the sun shone down the main street on Alexander the Great’s birthday.
Henry VIII put a tax on beards in 1535 (his own was exempt).
King David I of Scotland gave tax rebates to subjects with good table manners.
Queen Victoria could eat a seven-course meal in under half an hour.
The Queen does the washing-up once a year, in a special hut at Balmoral.
King John I of France was proclaimed king five months before he was born and lived for five days.  

Human bone is four times stronger than concrete.

After a double hand transplant, right-handed patients can become left-handed.

A human being can survive for nine seconds at 1000˚C without suffering lasting damage.

Since 1940, 157 people have fallen from planes without parachutes and survived.

Having a younger brother or sister can increase your blood pressure by more than 5%.

In the 1720s, the Gloucester Journal apologised for ‘the present scarcity of news’ and offered a selection of poems instead.

The oldest dance still performed is the Austrian shoe-slapping dance.

In the 19^th century, a 5-foot 6-inch footman cost £20/year; a full six-footer cost £40/year.

For 214 years, until 2012, it was illegal in Paris for women to wear trousers. 

The guillotine was last used in France in 1977.

François le Clerc is the only known pirate to have had a peg-leg.
Only one pirate is known to have buried any treasure.
There is only one recorded case of ‘walking the plank’.
There is no historical evidence for any pirate having ever owned a pet parrot.

The ingredient that makes Brussels sprouts bitter is cyanide.

15 apricot kernels contain enough cyanide to kill a child. 

A medium-sized tube of toothpaste contains enough chemicals to kill 13 dogs.  

You only need to be one metre underwater to be protected from bullets.

A flu virus can only survive on most surfaces for 48 hours, but can live on a banknote for 17 days.

Moths can be trained to detect plastic explosives. 

Diamonds boil at 4,027˚C.
In a 2004 experiment, 70% of Britons handed over their computer passwords in exchange for chocolate.

Latin and Gaelic have no words for ‘yes’ or ‘no’.

The Irish language has one set of numbers for arithmetic, one for counting humans and one for counting non-humans. 

The Andamanese language has only two words for numbers: them mean ‘one’ and ‘more than one’.  

Korean has no words for ‘brother’ or ‘sister’, only words for an older/younger brother/sister. 

The Amondawa people of the Amazon have no word for ‘time’.

The Mayan calendar had five days per year that were known as ‘days with no name’.
The world’s oldest legal system, in ancient Mesopotamia, established beer as a unit of currency.

I hope you enjoyed these, and found some intriguing, even if none of them end up being used in your writing! 

What's your favourite random fact - do you have one to share? Or what's your favourite worldbuilding feature of your story world?