Building Believable Worlds

Rebecca Tran

Image by Comfreak on Pixabay

Creating a believable world in your book can be more challenging for some authors than others. Genre, setting, and time period have the largest influence on the world you are building. Typically, books set in the real world in modern times are the easiest to write. However, research is key if you plan to set your story in an actual city or location. You never know when a reader that lives in or has visited that city. If your details are incorrect, they will notice, and you will hear about it.

Period pieces are more forgiving depending on your genre. Most readers are not history buffs, but

Image by alan9187 on Pixabay

they probably read the genre. Again research your time period. You want to include enough historically accurate details to keep your world believable. I like to say the devil is in the details. Costuming, weapons, and the style of buildings all lend realism.

Try to use reliable sources when researching time periods. Be especially careful when researching costuming choices. Thanks to Hollywood there are many mixups out there. Wikipedia is wrong from time to time so be careful. There are other sources available from universities and historical societies. These sources tend to be more reliable.

Image by KELLEPICS on Pixabay

The hardest yet most fun world to craft is a fantasy world. The first thing you have to figure out is setting and a general time period. For example, is your world similar to earth now or is it an alien world with three moons and very little technology. Everything builds from here. This will determine costumes, building styles, weapons, and even dialogue.

When building your world, your characters may have a need to travel, and everywhere they go needs a name. Naming towns can be challenging. There are several methods to name cities, towns and even streets. Many websites offer name generators; some are better than others. I personally never cared for using them although they are fun to play with. You can reuse city names if they fit with your character naming scheme. My personal favorite is to collect street and subdivision names. Many of them fit in well with the fantasy books I write. For instance, Meadowbrook is a local street name and would make an excellent town name.  I used to keep a notebook in my purse or car at all times for ideas or good names. Now I just put them in the notes section on my phone.

I am a blogger and author of fantasy and romance novels. I have two small children a Boston Terrier and a Pitbull. I love all things sci-fi and fantasy. Comic books and anime are always welcome in my house, and Doctor Who is my favorite show.
Currently, I have 11 titles available ranging from sci-fi, fantasy, and romance. My current favorite series is my dragon shifter series: Dragons of the North and Dragons of the South 1& 2. If you would like to learn more about me or my books you can find it at these links.

World building in Science Fiction part 1

There are 2 major questions that I get as a science fiction author:

1. Where do you get your ideas?
2. How do you create such a vivid world?

Now the first question is one that authors have been asked for as long as there has been publishing.

“Every artist gets asked the question, ‘Where do you get your ideas?’ The honest artist answers, ‘I steal them.’” – Austin Kleon

"From the Idea-of-the-Month Club"  - Neil Gaiman 

"Poughkeepsie.- Harlan Ellison 

 Now for me the where and how do I build my world are intertwined.

So I will try to explain. I looked at current communications technology and the sudden push into wearables. This got me to thinking about what is possible in a wearable and then what impact it could have on society. So from my concept notes:

Personal comms/ net  

Most people have built-in small personal communicator that allows them to communicate and surf the internet with data coming up on retinal implants can provide “heads up display as well as video feed and recording. They also can get full data net access the same way. Wrist pads offer external recording option for when you want to be seen when talking to someone and for holographic displays of data etc. Wrist pads are personalized to look like bracelets, sports bands, old style smart watches, gauntlets etc. Most have basic AI / personal assistant (Siri grown up) 

Ok, so that is the tech, but unless you are into communications technology this will leave you feeling something is missing. So rather than tell it this way in the story, I got to thinking how it would affect society (think about what the car did to society).

             Social side effects:

An always connected intelligence has led to a reduction of personal attacks and reduced problems like rape due to the ability of the semi intelligent devices recording and broadcasting full 3d holograms in real-time to the police, but also the medical state of the victim – preventing the claims of the person asking for it or liking it. The recordings with GPS locations lead to an almost 100% conviction rate that led to a steady decline in violent crimes. It also had the side effect of increasing the legal establishments for those who prefer violent or non-standard behaviors (not just sex) where the employees are either personally enjoying it or good actors who have “signed up” for these acts for quite a high pay.

Some of these effects are suddenly being debated in terms of the auto-call feature in the new iWatch and the rights of police responding to enter without an warrant.

So now I have an interesting future tech, an idea about how it will affect people and how they will interact with it. This leaves the rest of the world.

I chose our Solar System, but you can choose any world or place you want.

In my next installment, I will explain how I build it from the "ground up."

If you want to read about how other authors build their worlds, I do a weekly blog interview at https://www.ericlklein.com/feature-friday-futures/  where you can find many authors discussing the worlds in their novels.

Photos of 2 works by  Lissanne Lake that are hanging on my wall.

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COMMENTS

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Toi Thomas

4 months ago  -  Shared publicly

Great post Eric. I like how you explain the practicality of technology, including all the difficulties that may arise from its use. Your work sounds interesting and complex. Thanks for sharing.

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Toi Thomas via Google+

4 months ago  -  Shared publicly

Today, Eric Klein discusses science fiction world building an technology over at #OurAuthorGang.

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P. J. Mann

4 months ago  -  Shared publicly

What an interesting post! Although I am pretty much an old school person (can be the age) I find it very fascinating topic, and I can't see the time to read your next post.

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Joe Bonadonna via Google+

4 months ago  -  Shared publicly

Today on #OurAuthorGang, one of our newest members, author Eric Klein, brings us World-Building in Science Fiction.

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Joe Bonadonna

4 months ago  -  Shared publicly

Great post, Eric!  I've done a LOT of world-building for my fantasy stories. I've always found building worlds for science fiction to be a more daunting task. I had to do a little for my space opera, but that story didn't require a lot.  When I set out to write my sword and planet adventure, however, I had no choice but to build a complete world. There was no way around it. If I was going to write about a planet's ecosystem and endangered species, I needed to plot it all out. I borrow, too: my Questron instantaneous, sub-space communications transmitter is actually Ursula K. LeGuin's "Ansible." Look forward to more of your posts. Welcome to the blog! 

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Ruth de Jauregui

4 months ago  -  Shared publicly

Great post Eric! I love speculative fiction in all its forms. This is fascinating!

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Ruth de Jauregui via Google+

4 months ago  -  Shared publicly

Author Eric Klein shares his world building process on #OurAuthorGang today. Fascinating -- he starts with technology and how it affects people and society.

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Nikki McDonagh

4 months ago  -  Shared publicly

Interesting post Eric. As a fellow sci-fi writer, world building is something I really enjoy as you can let your imagination fly.

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Lorraine Carey

4 months ago  -  Shared publicly

Great post, Eric. I really think those who write SciFi have quite a sophisticated imagination. I admire that. Your works sounds most intriguing.Thank you for sharing.

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Erika M Szabo

4 months ago  -  Shared publicly

Interesting post Eric! When you write sci-fi you have to build a complete, believable world with technical details while in fantasy stories, which I write, I can let my imagination fly. I'm looking forward to your series.

Deserts and Tundra #OurAuthorGang

Rich Feitelberg

feitelberg.net

[Author's Note: While my series of posts on world-building is complete, I forgot to include this one, as promised. To correct this, here's the missing information for all you world-building fans. Enjoy.]

Deserts are unique places you'll want to include in your world-building plans. They occur where there is little to no rain to support grass and moss. Where there is rain, dry grasslands or scrub land result. So it makes sense to place desert next to scrub land or where the land is so broken (like the American Southwest) that only the hardiest plants and animals can thrive.

But all deserts are not the same. They are as varied as forests and grasslands, with their own ecosystems. We'll talk about placing animals and other resources soon enough, but when placing a desert in your world, think about the type of place it is and what lives there.

Consider our own world. The Sahara, with endless dunes is a very different desert from the American southwest which is rockier and full of cacti. In the Sahara, you have oases with palm trees, camels, and humans. Elsewhere there are hyenas and jackals scavenging for food. Snakes and scorpions are also common. If you want this type of desert in your world, think about what else might inhabit the sands.

The American Southwest, on the other hand, is home to some amazing geological formations. It is dry and rocky. Images of the Grand Canyon or the Mojave Desert come to mind as example for these types of deserts. Here, there are snakes and lizards, but there are also tortoises, spiders, cougars, ravens, owls, hawks, and ground squirrels. Since the desert in this area are not on the equator (like the Sahara) they have more of a seasonal fluctuation in temperature. They don't have seasons as most days are dry and warm (or hot) and nighttime can get very cold.

Tundra is another ecologically unique place and if your stories take place in the far north or on mountain plateaus, you should consider add tundra to your world. If you decide to include this type of terrain, place it in far northern climates. On our world that is north of the Arctic circle and on high mountains plateaus beyond the timber line.

Like desert, tundra has very specially plants and animals that live there. Let's look at our own world for examples. In the far north of Alaska and Canada, where it is too cold for trees to grow, tundra begins. Here the land is covered in grass, moss, and lichens. The land is flat here making it a good place for herd animals, such as caribou, reindeer, and musk oxen, to graze. Arctic hares, arctic foxes, migratory birds and polar bears also roam the tundra. Farther north are the ice caps of our world and as the weather turns colder, the snow and ice of the Arctic invades the areas of tundra for the fall and winter burying the grass until the spring thaw.

Tundra also occurs in high mountain plateaus, such as in the Alps, the Andes mountains, and the Himalayas. If you select a more mountainous site for tundra, then the plants and animals living that may differ from the ones I listed. For example, there won't be polar bears, but there are likely to be mountain goats and mountain lions. Adjust the ecosystem of your world as well, placing the most appropriate plants and animals in this cold and harsh locale.

Also feel free to research both types of environments for more detailed looks at them. I've given only a quick sketch here of each type of terrain. You'll want to be more though and when you combine these terrains with other types of vegetation and terrain, deserts and tundra give your world a realistic feel.

While they can be hard to place, I encourage you to do so.

Political World Building #OurAuthorGang

By Rich Feitelberg

feitelberg.net

When its time to create a map for your story, be sure to do it. Consider it part of the planning process. I like to develop the natural world first, but eventually, I know I have to deal with the political side of the equation. When that time comes, if I have a solid map of the natural order then many details fall out from the there.

For example, the location and abundance of resources will determine where people settle and what goods and services are available. So will the placement of rivers, the climate, and the vegetation. One might say that all the work I’ve been describing up to this point is in preparation for the political map.

As you go, consider the various races (or groups of people if everyone is human) in the world. What is there history? What is the culture? What do they value? Dwarves like gold and gems and these are found in mines underground so that’s where they live. Or you could say they like to live underground and use the resources in the ground to trade for other things they need like cloth, spices, and other things they don’t make themselves.

Also consider what religions are in play. Religion has shaped the course of history as much as politics has, perhaps more. You don’t have to create your own religions if you don’t want to but you should have an clue what happens when different groups with different ideologies meet.

War is a likely outcome. And speaking of war, you’ll want to know when, where, and why hostilities have broken out. Was it a religious difference or did one group want the resources of another group? Or did they fear the other group? Or do they raid routinely?

If magic or special abilities exist, consider how these powers affect history. Are the wizards organized enough to fight another government? Or are they like leaves in the wind?

Lastly, set the technology level in use. Do they use swords, armor, and bows, or machine guns and kevlar? It doesn’t need to be the same for everyone, but you do have to know what weapons each group is using so you can describe the effects correctly. Also, be careful to mix very different technologies together. It can be done, but only if you really know what you are doing.

To help you understand what I’m talking about here’s a sample from my fantasy world.

The technology level is swords, armor, and bows, consistent with a medieval society. There is magic and they are some what organized but they are too few of them (among humans) to rebel against the government.

The human government is a monarchy and the their religion is a generic Christian one, which people will recognize without going too deeply into it.

But there are other human governments, one that is based on vikings, and one that is middle eastern.

Among other races, I have a freer hand because there aren’t real world example to drawn from. So the elves like nature, magic, and finely carved things, living in the forest. The dwarves lives underground and mine gold, gems, iron, silver, and any other useful metal.

The dwarves kept to themselves mostly, but the elves and humans interacted then the humans got in trouble with magic. They summoned demons accidentally. The elven king went to fight them and ultimately died in the process, which caused a split in the elven community. Now humans need to fight the evil elves which has put a strain on the relationship with all elves.

Notice how one thing leads to another and sets up a background for the stories I want to tell. My fantasy novels are about how the humans finally deal with the evil elves.

So there you have it. Go forth and think about the history, politics, religion, magic, culture, and technology of all the groups in your stories. When you’re done, you’ll have plenty to write about.

World Building and Resources #ourauthorgang

By Rich Feitelberg

feitelberg.net

Well, if you've been reading all my blog posts and perhaps following along, you've come a long way. You've got a map with vegetation and elevation and climate all sorted out. Now you are ready to place resources on the map.

Knowing where the resources are is important because it will determine the cost of items and how common things like wood and iron are. If they are common and cheap then you can have buildings made from wood and you have iron tools for farming, combat, and all the others we need tools for.

It is also start to help you determine trade routes and where nations and roads develop. If all the iron is in the mountains where the dwarves live then humans will be trading with them for it; perhaps trading food or wool or clothe. And control of trade routes has made empires out of small nations so it is something to pay attention to.

You don't need to think of all the possible resources, but you should have an idea of the common ones and note this for the goods and services that characters in your stories need. This may seem like a lot of work for no benefit but this level of details adds realism. Of course it is where you probably need to also apply Tenet 1 (it's there for a reason!).

Once have your resources placed, you can have a look at the political map. We'll talk about that next time.

World Building and Vegetation #OurAuthorGang

By Rich Feitelberg

feitelberg.net

Obviously if you need to create a world for a story or series of stories, you need to have specific locations in mind so you can give the reader a sense of place. Each location can only exist in the context of a larger world and if the world is like ours that means there's vegetation growing about.

Vegetation grows only where conditions are favorable. If your world is a frozen ice planet, you needn't read any further. But for the rest of us, knowing where there are forests, grasslands, farmlands, and the like will help you give your world a sense of realism. Equally important is knowing the type of vegetation that's growing. This is where climate comes in.

Rain forests exists in the tropics, not in temperate zones. Northern forest are all coniferous, Temperature forests can have deciduous trees. Note the amount of water available in each area. Dense forests need more water (more rainfall) than sparingly forested areas. And actually it is the other way around, the more precipitation an area receive, the more densely forested it can be.

Where there's less water available, grasslands are likely. And these can range from tundra to scrublands, to wide plains of grass.

Once you figure out what your settings or world is like, create a map showing the forests and grasslands.

Likely where lands is irrigated, you'll have farms. In a medieval fantasy world like mine, large areas of lands must be set aside for farming to support the cities towns in the region. Otherwise everyone starves.

Note all this on your vegetation map or combine it with the elevation map to create a composite.

With all this done, you're ready to consider other types of terrain like deserts and swamps. We'll look at those next time.

Building an Elevation Map #OurAuthorGang

Rich Feitelberg

feitelberg.net

You want to build a world for a story or series of stories. You have the general points sketched out and you are thinking about the map you need. You can, of course, draw it -- or generate it -- at any time. But let's consider a few aspects of the geography first.

Geography not also defines the shape of land masses, but also an area's climate and resources as well. If your world has a molten core like ours, then volcanoes are possible and the surface is can be made of sliding plates which determine where the mountains are, and the shape of each continent. It will also tell you where there are quakes (usually along fault lines where two plates abut). Make a map of the elevation and the fault lines. It will help you later.

The US Geological Survey web site provides such topological maps of the United States, which can serve as an example. Your maps don't need to be that detailed (remember Tenet 1) but you should note where there are mountains, hills, and flat areas. Remember to provide a transitional area between mountains and flat terrain. Often there are hills in between.

Also keep in mind some mountains have volcanoes hidden among them. And not all hills are grassy knolls. Some of forested and some are barren. You don't need to consider this in the elevation map but it is something to think about for later.

Once you have these detailed sorted out you are ready for the vegetation map. We'll consider that next time.

Elevation from My Fantasy World, showing mountains and lakes

World Building and Astronomy#OurAuthorGang

By Rich Feitelberg

feitelberg.net

When building a whole world, I like to start with the big picture and work down. You don't have to do that, of course. You can start small and work up, but I start at the top and work out the details the way they would be if the world was real. So I usually start with the astronomy of the world. This includes things like:

What is the spectral class of the star the world orbits?

How far from this star is the world? This is another way of asking how many days are there in a year?

And while we are on the subject:

How long is a day? How are months determined? Typically it is based on the phases of the moon. If the world has no moons, you'll need another method to figure that out. You'll also need to think about what, if anything, affects the tides on the world (assuming there are oceans to influence).

What does the night sky look like? What are the constellations? How do they fit in the mythologies of the world? What are the signs of the zodiac?

How many planets are there in the star system your world belongs to? What are these planets like and how far away are they? Are any visible in the night sky from the world?

Some or all of these questions may be irrelevant for your world. Oz, Alice in Wonderland, and Middle Earth do not bother us with these details. And they rarely come into play in my fantasy novels. But they have and it is better to have answers at your fingertips than have to stop and fumble for answers.

Notice all of these questions place the world in a star system. You can design the planets that orbits that star and decide on the number of moons for your world. This can be fun and may even teach you a few things about our own planet.

For my world, I decided early that the sun, Arien, was like our sun, Sol, a yellow G3 star. And that my world was about the same distance from it as Earth is from our sun. The only change I made was I shortened the year by five days so the calendar math came out even. That meant my world was a little closer to Arien but not much. That would affect the seasons and temperatures a little but not by much.

Then I decided on two moons, Ibilik and Ezer. One of the moons affects the planet's tides and the other is too far away to do much of anything. The moons are always fifteen days out of sync with each other and the time it takes for each moon to cycle through its phases is exactly 30 days. That gives me 12 months of 30 days each.

To keep things simple, I kept seven days to a week because I found most people had a hard time if I changed the calendar too much. (My original plans were a 10-day week; the only problem with that no one could remember whether Cooksday was before or after Highday. So I abandoned it that part)

Then I designed the night sky for the northern and southern hemispheres. This ended up being important because my characters stargaze and my bard needs to know what the constellations are called and what stories there are around each. I went this far because the Greeks named most of our constellations and their mythology still surrounds them, if you care to learn about it.

So you can see that these details relate back to important aspects of the world as a whole. You may choose to ignore them, but if you don't you can add real flavor to your world.

Next time another deep dive.

The Arien Star System