Talking About Your Story Might Stop You From Actually Writing It

If you're friends with a writer, chances are good you've experienced what it's like when one of us has a story to tell. Under good circumstances you can sit with us over dinner and coffee, and spend hours exploring this strange world that lives inside our skulls. Under bad circumstances, you get drenched by the downpour that comes with our brainstorms.

However, there's an issue that I've found a lot of writers have... namely that once we've opened our mouths that we often forget to engage our hands, and actually write the stories we talk about.

It is, unfortunately, the hardest part of the process.

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Undercutting The Process

Before we go any deeper into this topic I want to be very clear, here; talking through your story is always a good idea. For a lot of writers it is an extremely necessary part of the process, allowing us to explore certain ideas, think out loud, and to get around problems in the plot.

With that said, sometimes writers get so enamored of talking about our stories that we don't actually write them. Put another way, it's like we showed up to bake a cake, but instead we just ate all the icing and called it a day.

If you slather it on thick enough, it will still support candles, right?

What I mean by just eating the icing is that, for a lot of writers, talking about the idea is the fun part of the process. Taking notes, building the world, engaging with the characters, asking questions, and sharing all of that with our friends is usually an engaging activity. It's where we have the most fun, and it's where we get the satisfaction of feedback, and sharing an experience with someone else.

However, this activity can actually make us take a shortcut past the actual hard work of writing the story if we aren't careful. Because we sat down and talked through the tale, we walked someone through all of the twists and turns, and explained the ending and themes we're going for, our brains then lose interest in it. It doesn't want to actually write that story anymore. Now it wants a new idea to get excited about, and to go through the whole process of exploration again.

This can be exhausting for everyone involved. If you're the writer who finds themselves constantly avoiding the final step of writing the story, you may feel like you're constantly caught between the boring drudgery of forcing yourself to chronicle an idea you're no longer interested in and taking hits of good brain chemicals while you daydream about newer, more exciting ideas. Those who get pulled into these exercises might also feel tired after a while because for all the fun of the creative process, it can feel like the story is never going anywhere; that it's all just a bunch of hot air that's never going to lead to anything.

How do you fix it, though?

Sadly, I don't have an answer to this. If I did, I'd write a book, become a bestseller, and retire. But the best advice I can give is that you need to want the book done more than you want the enjoyment of just playing around in another sandbox. I'm not saying you shouldn't think about other ideas, and that you shouldn't give yourself moments of play and fun while you're slogging through a novel, but you need to make sure that you don't abandon the story you had just because you've moved from drawing the blueprints to actually building the thing.

If I do find more useful tricks, though, rest assured that I'll share them as soon as I come across them!

Looking For Some Additional Reading?

I don't really have any neat segues, but I figured I'd leave some additional links for folks who just want to kill a little time, and help me out a bit. If you're down for giant robots fighting alien bugs in a life-or-death battle in the grim darkness of the far future, check out Broken Heroes if you haven't seen it yet! If you'd like to step into an ongoing saga about resistance to fantasy fascists, and the deeds of a shadowy vigilante attempting to free the city from the boot on its neck, then read the first of The Silver Raven Chronicles!

And if you're a fan of the World of Darkness, you should definitely take a moment or three to listen to the latest adventure Jacoby has found himself on in The Butcher's Door, dramatized below! Don't forget to subscribe to the Azukail Games YouTube channel if you enjoy it, as well.

Like, Follow, and Come Back Again!

That's all for this week's Craft of Writing! For more of my work, check out my Vocal archive, or at My Amazon Author Page where you can find books like my sword and sorcery novel Crier's Knife, or my most recent short story collection The Rejects!

 

And to stay on top of all my latest news and releases, collected once a week, make sure you subscribe to The Literary Mercenary's mailing list. 

If you'd like to help support my work, then consider Buying Me A Ko-Fi, or heading over to The Literary Mercenary's Patreon page! Lastly, to keep up with my latest, follow me on Facebook, Tumblr, Twitter, and now on Pinterest as well!

Authors, Don't Take Yourself So Seriously

If you've ever sat down to talk marketing with a romance author, then you know just how serious professionals in the trade can be when it comes down to the bottom line on book sales. Everything from which sales pitch works best, to cold-reading someone at a convention, to which social media platforms are most effective for moving product, what goes on once the manuscript hits the market is definitely serious business.

But before that? Let's all just take a moment to be honest with each other... we're making up stories. They might be heartfelt stories with moments of great pathos. They may have a lot of meaning to you, and hopefully to your readers. But they're also about wish fulfillment, Vikings riding dinosaurs, impossibly good looking secret agents, vampire princes, and zombie love triangles.

We should be serious about our work, but our work itself is rarely serious... and if we take it too seriously, the work suffers. Badly.

But what is the true meaning of this work? Do you understand?

As always, before I get too deep on this week's topic make sure you sign up for my weekly newsletter to make sure you don't miss anything! Also, if you want to help me keep the wheels turning around here consider becoming a Patreon patron as well.

Lastly, to get all my information in one place, just click on over to my Linktree!

Most Great Work Wasn't Written To Be Such

You've heard of Frankenstein I'm assuming? That book which is one of the great entries in the canon of horror, and which one could argue was the seed that created the entire science fiction genre? A work of important literature, no doubt, as I'm sure most of us acknowledge.

What we sometimes forget, though, is that it was also written by one of the OG teen goths during a long weekend full of sex and drugs with one of the more infamous party animals of the day. A book that was created on a bet during a stormy night as Mary, her husband, and their host were taking a break between threesomes.

Mary knew how to party, is what I'm saying.

Example of this are everywhere in so-called literature. Shakespeare might be considered high-brow these days, but it's just a collection of dick and fart jokes where characters get progressively gayer and more outlandish. Also, it was written as popular entertainment for the masses. The whole basis of The Lord of The Rings is because Tolkien was telling tales to his kids, and one of them was very concerned with canonical consistency. This led to The Hobbit, and demand for more of those tales led to one of the more influential works that created the genre of high fantasy. Jane Austen's work is arguably one, big eyeroll from the author about the tedium of social nicety, wrapped up in flowery language and with a story a lot of readers can identify with.

This list goes on.

The point of all of this is that most of what we think of as "serious" books (and even a lot of films) were not made with the intention of being great, foundational works of art, or redefining the way we look at stories. They were written on a whim, on a bet, or as an example of crass commercialism to get butts in seats, or books in hands. And while the authors arguably took the work seriously (constructing good narratives, creating engaging characters, telling a good tale, etc.) they didn't take themselves and their task seriously. Because while good books will often stand the test of time, it's the story they tell, and the way they engage the audience that matters.

So lighten up already! Just embrace that, at its core, what we do is a silly kind of magic. It can touch people's lives, brighten their dark days, and stab them through the heart, but the more seriously we take ourselves the more it's going to take our focus off of telling a good story.

Looking For Additional Reading?

If you're looking for additional stuff to check out before you go, might I recommend the following?

- 5 Tips For Creating Fantasy Towns and Cities: I've been up to my elbows in professional fantasy world building for most of this year, and these are the tips I've found most useful for making sure places feel organic, no matter how fantastical they are.

- The Silver Raven Chronicles Part One: Devil's Night: A free fantasy short story, this tale begins in the old quarter of the city of Kintargo. A rumor whispers in the corners of a ghost risen from the past to take Cheliax to task for allowing devils into its heart, and its throne room. Most don't believe it... but one of the city's dottari finds this ghost is all too real when it steps out of the shadows with a message for her to spread to her fellow enforcers. They are no longer welcome in his city.

Like, Follow, and Come Back Again!

That's all for this week's Craft of Writing! For more of my work, check out my Vocal archive, or at My Amazon Author Page where you can find books like my cat noir novel Marked Territory, its sequel Painted Cats, my sword and sorcery novel Crier's Knife, or my most recent short story collection The Rejects!

 

And to stay on top of all my latest news and releases, collected once a week, make sure you subscribe to The Literary Mercenary's mailing list. 

If you'd like to help support my work, then consider Buying Me A Ko-Fi, or heading over to The Literary Mercenary's Patreon page! Lastly, to keep up with my latest, follow me on Facebook, Tumblr, Twitter, and now on Pinterest as well!

When Building a New World, Follow The Ripples

For those who don't know, I've been actively working on a fantasy RPG setting since the start of 2021. I'll have more details on Sundara: Dawn of a New Age below for those who are curious, but there's something important that I've learned throughout this process that I think fellow writers (whether you're a novelist, a games creator, or somewhere in between) need to keep firmly in their sights.

Namely that whenever you're designing a world you need to take every element not just at its face value, but to ask how this element could change or alter the setting going forward. Or, phrased another way, if you're throwing a rock into a pond, watch the ripples and see how far they go.

But what if we made magic super common?

Before we get into the details, you all know the drill by now. Subscribe to my weekly newsletter to stay on top of all my updates, and if you've got any dosh to spare consider tossing it my way by becoming a Patreon patron! Every little bit helps.

Every Change Can Have Implications

The fun of world building is that you get to put settings together in different configurations to see what happens. You can tinker with everything from the climate, to the social structures of your people, to what strange and fantastical species exist in your world. You decide how magic works, what technological innovations exist, what gods are or aren't in this world, everything!

However, there is a flip side to this astonishing amount of power, and it's one that occasionally gets overlooked. Because if something exists in a setting, you have to ask what the implications of that thing's presence are, and how it can alter your world as a whole.

Let's take dragons... as an example.

So, let's say your world has dragons. Awesome! Dragons are cool, and they always grab people's attention. However, every element of dragons in your setting will shape the way the world functions, and you need to ask what that means to your setting, and the stories you tell within it.

For example, are dragons sapient creatures, or are they merely large and dangerous animals? If the latter, then are dragonslayers a required profession to help deal with these territorial beasts the way you'd have game wardens or animal control officers? If dragons are intelligent creatures capable of thought and reason, though, then are there accords for negotiating with them? Do they form agreements with surrounding nations, or do they merely take what they want using their power? In either case, are dragons prized for their body parts once they're slain? Because if their blood enchants swords that are quenched in it, or their scales are impenetrable to normal steel, or their teeth can cure disease when powdered, that will make them highly prized assets to poachers looking to make a profit off a dragon's corpse.

You can keep asking questions like this (Are dragons used as mounts by elite warriors? Incorporated into armies? Do they bond with particular species?) all day long. And there's no wrong answer to these questions... but you do need to have answers, and those answers could lead to more questions as the ripples spread outward.

And you need those answers in order for your setting to have verisimilitude.

As an example, say that your setting has a kind of quartz in it that can hold a charge from magic to act as a power or light source. If such an item exists, why are people still lighting their streets and homes with candles and torches? Is it because the mineral is rare, and thus wouldn't be used for that sort of thing? Perhaps. Because if it were common then it's likely it would be used at least in towns and cities near where wizards train their apprentices, or where sorcerers tend to be born. Even if it's not universal, its presence could be a sign of a town moving up in status, showing that they can afford to have a lamp-lighter's guild made up of apprentices and journeymen wizards.

This Applies To Damn Near Everything

Almost every aspect of a world is going to have implications like this. They won't always be center stage and of import to your current plot and story, but it's important to think about them and to consider what aspects of your world might mean if extrapolated on. From whether your kingdoms use paper money, to whether they have a banking system, to whether elves and orcs can have children with partners outside their species, it's important to think through all aspects of a setting in order to make sure your world has internal consistency for the reader.

And because sometimes you'll find that an idea gets way wilder than you expected it to... and it turns out to be a far bigger and more interesting addition to your story than you expected it to be!

Incidentally, if you haven't seen it yet, you might want to check out 5 Tips For Creating Fantasy Towns and Cities. It's something I put together that has helped solidify my process, and I figured it would be of use to other creators!

As For The World I'm Building... Well...

I've been hard at work on Sundara: Dawn of a New Age for months now, and every time a new release for it drops the setting gets just a little bit stranger! So whether you want to see cities atop mountains ruled by a cooperation of dragons, massive volcanic forges making crucible steel, metropolises cared for by armies of the living dead, and more, check out some of the Cities of Sundara installments below!

Seriously, give them a look for yourself!

- Ironfire: The City of Steel (Pathfinder and 5E): Built around the Dragon Forge, Ironfire is where the secret to dragon steel was first cracked. The center of the mercenary trade in the region, as well as boasting some of the finest schools for teaching practical sciences, Ironfire is a place where discovery and danger walk hand in hand!

- Moüd: The City of Bones (Pathfinder and 5E): An ancient center of trade and magic, Moüd was lost to a cataclysm, and then buried in myth. Reclaimed by the necromantic arts of the Silver Wraiths guild, this city has once again become a place teeming with life. Despite the burgeoning population, though, it is the continued presence of the undead that helps keep the city running, ensuring that Moüd is not swallowed up once more.

- Silkgift: The City of Sails (Pathfinder and 5E): Built on the cottage industry of Archer cloth (an extremely durable material used for sails, windmills, etc.), Silkgift is a place that prizes invention and discovery. From gravity batteries that store the potential of the wind, to unique irrigation systems, to aether weapons, the city positively churns out discoveries... and then there's the canal they cut through the mountains that makes them a major center of trade across the region.

- Hoardreach: The City of Wyrms (Pathfinder and 5E): A center of power across an entire region, Hoardreach is ruled over by a Cooperation of five different dragons. A place for refugees and outcasts of all sorts, Hoardreach boasts some of the most unusual citizens and creations from across Sundara. Infamous for their sky ships, which require the cast-off scales and unique arcane sciences of the Dragon Works to take to the air, one never knows just what they'll find in this city built atop a mountain.

- Archbliss: The City of The Sorcerers (Pathfinder and 5E): A floating city in the sky, Archbliss has been a refuge for sorcerers for thousands of years. It's only in relatively recent years that the city has allowed those from the ground below who lack the power of a bloodline to join them in the clouds. However, while there are certainly amazing wonders to behold, there is a darkness in Archbliss. Something rotting away at its heart that could, if not healed, bring the city crashing to the ground once more.

Like, Follow, and Come Back Again!

That's all for this week's Craft of Writing! For more of my work, check out my Vocal archive, or at My Amazon Author Page where you can find books like my cat noir novel Marked Territory, its sequel Painted Cats, my sword and sorcery novel Crier's Knife, or my most recent short story collection The Rejects!

 

And to stay on top of all my latest news and releases, collected once a week, make sure you subscribe to The Literary Mercenary's mailing list. 

If you'd like to help support my work, then consider Buying Me A Ko-Fi, or heading over to The Literary Mercenary's Patreon page! Lastly, to keep up with my latest, follow me on Facebook, Tumblr, Twitter, and now on Pinterest as well!

The Challenges of Writing Modern Fantasy Without a Masquerade

If you've read most modern fantasy, you're familiar with the Masquerade. It is, in short, the idea that the vampires, werewolves, fey creatures, witches, wizards, etc., move among the masses without being seen by the general population. Whether it's by magic, by constantly staying in the shadows, by manipulating media to make their very existence seem ludicrous, or just the idea that a majority of people will not believe what their own eyes tell them, the Masquerade is a common theme in a lot of modern fantasy because it serves two, important purposes.

The first is that it allows the author to keep our world, and its history, intact. If the supernatural community was kept behind the curtain, then as far as we know our history happened more or less how we think, giving the writer carte blanche to make edits and changes as the story progresses. This immediately gives the audience a foot in the door, as they know the real world, and can add the fantastic elements to it as the story progresses. The second thing it does is that it creates the illusion that this fantastical world could exist right under our noses. All you need to do is walk down the right alley on the right night, and you could find yourself in this world, too.

Oh dear... just how did you wind up in a place like this?

However, there are writers and readers alike who've grown sick of the Masquerade. They want modern fantasy stories where the magic and the monsters walk out in full daylight, and where there's no secret about who and what they are. And while you most certainly can do that, it is by no means an easier task to accomplish. The Masquerade does a lot of unexpected heavy lifting for you, and removing it means that burden falls squarely on your shoulders.

Before we get into it this week, make sure you sign up for my weekly newsletter to stay on top of all my releases. Also, speaking of unusual modern fantasy stories, my second hard-boiled cat novel dropped, so if you enjoyed my Maine coon heavy Leo's adventures in Marked Territory, then you are going to have an absolute ball with Painted Cats!

You Will Need To Re-Write History

In The Gold Bug by Edgar Allan Poe a man drops a golden scarab through a skull nailed to the end of a tree branch. The difference between one eye socket and the other, once the characters take 30 or so paces out in a particular direction, is the difference between an empty hole in the ground, and finding a king's ransom in buried treasure.

That situation is sort of what you deal with when you do away with the Masquerade. Because it's going to change history, and the further back you go, the more changes will be made.

The difference a few inches can make.

As an example, say that supernatural creatures have only been in public for a short period of time. This is, more or less, the sort of setup we have in True Blood. For while vampires have been around forever, they finally stepped out of hiding (along with a lot of other creatures), and the world is still changing to reflect this impact. But all the time they were hiding behind the curtain? Well, that history remains intact.

But go further back with it, and see how that alters things.

For instance, what would happen in vampires came out of hiding in the 80s? Or if werewolves were public knowledge in the 60s? After decades of being part of the world, how does their presence alter things? Are certain types of movies just not allowed to be made due to public outcry, with schlocky trash considered vamp-sploitation? Have civil rights progressed for supernatural creatures? Can they serve in the military, or in public office? Has science been able to understand anything about these creatures? Can lycanthropy cure cancer? Is there a push to use more plastic and aluminum in public spaces so that fey creatures aren't hurt by touching iron? Are vampires limited in the places they can live due to the widespread nature of churches? Are there hate groups that focus on these creatures?

You could go back even further, too. What effects did these creatures have on world events like the Great Wars? Are they found across the world, or only in certain places, and how has that shaped culture there? Have laws needed to be changed for life sentences (or life appointments) for creatures that are functionally immortal? The earlier the Masquerade dropped, the more the presence of the supernatural will alter the course of how the world developed.

You're Generally Better Off Making Your Own World

My two cents on this issue is that if you don't want to do a massive amount of world building for an alternate historical timeline, but you still want a modern fantasy world where elves, orcs, shapeshifters, etc. are a part of the day-to-day world, then you should just make your own, unique setting. Because at the end of the day it's usually a lot easier than trying to ask how things would have been different of Rome had been ruled by elves, and the Germanic tribes had been united by orcs come down from the mountains, and how that changed the events of the past few thousand years on Earth.

On the one hand, this is not a small undertaking. You need to dope out finance systems, technology, political relationships, cultures, and a thousand other things just to make the world feel like a real, lived-in place. At the same time, though, you're free to make those things regardless of what Earth's actual timeline was like, and without trying to mold our real world history, nations, etc. to fit what you're trying to do with your fantasy. It gives you total freedom to get as weird and wild as you want to!

Yeah, Smith and Wizards just dropped this beauty. You wanna talk trash now?

Unless your story needs our real world to act as the foundation for some reason (either to provide that extra escapism of the fantasy within reality, or to try to make a statement on how history might have gone differently with one or two fantastical alterations to the timeline), you shouldn't feel tied to using the world we all know and live in. Because unless it's required that you have New York, or Chicago, or Tokyo as a touch stone for some reason, don't tie yourself into knots to make them part of your setting.

Instead, take us to new places we've never seen before. Places where elven private eyes carry spell-slinging side arms, where werewolf orcs act as muscle for the mob, and where gnomish scientists try to crack the code of creation using a combination of ancient spells and a large hadron collider. Because that's going to be way more interesting, refreshing, and unique than another Shadowrun homage where in the year 20XX the event happened, and now there's ogres, trolls, elves, etc. in the real world because we want them here now.

Like, Follow, and Come Back Again!

That's all for this week's Craft of Writing! For more of my work, check out my Vocal archive, or at My Amazon Author Page where you can find books like my cat noir novel Marked Territory, its sequel Painted Cats, my sword and sorcery novel Crier's Knife, or my most recent short story collection The Rejects!

 

And to stay on top of all my latest news and releases, collected once a week, make sure you subscribe to The Literary Mercenary's mailing list. 

If you'd like to help support my work, then consider Buying Me A Ko-Fi, or heading over to The Literary Mercenary's Patreon page! Lastly, to keep up with my latest, follow me on Facebook, Tumblr, Twitter, and now on Pinterest as well!

Don't Barrage Your Readers With Fantasy Terminology (It Doesn't Help)

"My name is A'lashan Fai'r," the Dowindra said, smiling. "Welcome to Sar'boran."

I nodded, and adjusted the corfan at my side. I looked around the Fenuril, and saw other Redanda standing at their posts. Shu'fi moved among them, heads bowed as they attended to their tasks. I touched the dinfar just behind my ear, and felt more than heard the chirping affirmative it gave.

"Thank you," I said. "Please, take me to the Umbrine. I have news that will not wait."

What the shit did I just read?

If you've read your share of fantasy novels over the years, chances are good you've come across passages like this more than once. Ideally you'll only see nonsense like this later on in the novel (or hopefully down the line in the series) when the reader already knows what all these terms mean so they can properly picture a scene. Too often, though, authors will just dump barrels of fantasy terminology onto their readers' heads, forgetting that while they have lived in this made-up world for years, the reader just got here, and they have no clue what you're talking about.

Also, before we get into the meat of this, don't forget to sign up for my weekly newsletter so you don't miss any of my updates!

What The Hell is That?

If you review the paragraph I opened with, you realize that there's no context for almost any of the names and terms getting thrown around. What is a confar, for example? Is it a weapon? A badge of office? Both? Neither? And the person our protagonist is talking to is referred to as a Dowindra. Is that a profession? A species? A social position? What the hell is that thing behind his ear? Is it an actual cricket, like a magical creature, or some kind of bonded enchantment that connects to his brain?

You're introducing your reader to a world that's foreign to them. If you just dump them in the deep end, though, they're going to feel like they're reading an upper-level science textbook with absolutely zero foundational knowledge to understand what they're looking at.

And what the hell is this nonsense?

In order to ease the reader into your world you need to give them a sense of the familiar first. Allow them to get their bearings. For example, is your setting more urban, or agrarian? Cities and farms are concepts that readers can easily grasp, and it will give them some kind of context before you come down to more confusing details like the made up name of a city or country, districts, the ranks of the rulers, etc. Even with smaller elements, you get far more if you focus on descriptions before you assign names to things so that your reader actually knows what they're supposed to be envisioning later on when the name pops up again.

As an example, consider the following.

The stranger glanced around the room, his eyes taking in everything and everyone. His right hand never strayed far from the blade hanging from his hip. Short and curved, with a heavy guard, the steel practically hummed with power; a sleeping dragon waiting to roar into life. Though the stranger seemed a hard, dangerous man on his own, the confar announced that he was there on the orders of the guild.

This sort of thing gives your audience a much clearer image of what a confar is (a potent sidearm), and the sort of people who wield it (professional fighters in service to a particular guild). But before the item was named it was described, and given an association with an individual to help put what it is into context, and why seeing it might be kind of a big deal.

Once you've established what something is, you can just refer to it by name. Whether it's a particular fantasy species, an ethnicity, a magic item, a social rank, once you've given your audience a tutorial/introduction to it, you can cement it as part of the lexicon.

Easing The Reader In

Most folks who write genre fiction understand that they need to explain some things to readers. Common tropes and elements can usually be put in without much explanation (we get what a troll, or an orc, or a goblin is, so you only need to fill in the blanks if it differentiates from "standard" fantasy tropes), but anything that has an unfamiliar word attached to it needs an explanation to make it stick in the reader's minds.

There's another thing to remember, though... you need to pepper these things in here and there. Don't try to make your reader's do the cinnamon challenge to try to swallow everything at once.

Just three more schools of magic... you can do it!

If your readers get a lot of terms just thrown at their face right out of the gate, it becomes a distraction from the story you're actually trying to tell, and the world you're trying to build. Then instead of falling in love with your protagonist, or getting invested in the threat imperiling your setting, they're just trying to remember the difference between the Alfashni and Kekouri, and which ones have beaks, and why they're so sensitive about jokes regarding coconuts.

Space out how often you introduce new elements to the world, and try to feed them to your reader in some kind of sensical order. The easier it is to chew the lessons, the less they're going to distract or frustrate your audience as they try to get into your story.

Like, Follow, and Come Back Again!

That's all for this week's Craft of Writing! For more of my work, check out my Vocal archive, or at My Amazon Author Page where you can find books like my cat noir novel Marked Territory, my sword and sorcery novel Crier's Knife, or my most recent short story collection The Rejects!

 

And to stay on top of all my latest news and releases, collected once a week, make sure you subscribe to The Literary Mercenary's mailing list. 

If you'd like to help support my work, then consider Buying Me A Ko-Fi, or heading over to The Literary Mercenary's Patreon page! Lastly, to keep up with my latest, follow me on Facebook, Tumblr, Twitter, and now on Pinterest as well!

You Really Can't Do Too Much Research For Your Book

One of the major appeals of writing fiction is the idea that if you don't know the answer to something that you can just make it up. Not sure how light is focused into a beam that fires from the tip of your futuristic private eye's laser pistol? Good news, you can just create the mystery element of the Forunex crystal that makes light-based weaponry practical and compact. Unsure of how spontaneous combustion would be possible from a physics and chemistry standpoint? Well, since the Devotees of Fire are granted power by their god, it's magic so you don't have to explain a damn thing!

It can really make your life as a creator easier in a lot of respects.

In other respects, though...

A problem that a lot of writers run into, though, is they get too drunk on their own creative abilities. Just because something is fictional, that doesn't mean you shouldn't at least do a Google search, or crack a book, to make sure you aren't going in the completely wrong direction.

 

Also, before we continue on, make sure you sign up for my weekly newsletter to be sure you don't miss any of my updates!

Let's Look at Werewolves For a Second

Oh yeah, we're going to fight about this.

If you've ever read a piece of werewolf fiction, or even played a game like Werewolf: The Apocalypse, you're likely very familiar with the idea of strong alpha leaders, the right hand of the beta, and the shifty omega no one likes. These are terms and ideas that are used to describe the structure of wolf packs, thereby allowing the reader to have one foot in reality, and one foot in a fantasy.

Unless they've read a science article since roughly 1980 or so.

As Knowledge Nuts points out, the idea of violent struggles for dominance is what you see in captive wolf packs. When wolves have no relation to one another, and no existing family structure, which means these wolves were basically in animal prison. In the wild wolves act nothing like this. They're tight-knit family groups that care for one another, and a wolf's age is a far more likely indicator of status than how violent or aggressive they are. So trying to map the social dynamic of a violent prison gang onto all werewolves actually undercuts your attempt to bridge reality with fiction if the reader is aware you're citing debunked, outdated ideas in the story.

This is just a small example of how you need to make sure your research impacts the fiction you're creating. And the more closely tied to reality your fantasy is, the more research you need to do. Because if your central conceit is, "I have giant robots in my story," then you can probably just ask your audience to buy that without going into too many details of the physics or how these huge machines function. But if your story is set in a near-future Moscow, then it would probably help to actually research the culture of the country, the function of the government, and the ranks of the armed forces to make sure you get those things correct. Especially if your robot's pilot would have to complete regular military training, and then meet the standards of that country before being allowed into the heavy armored division.

You Can Never Know Too Much

While it's possible to go overboard on description and detail, and to bog your book down with adverbs or purple prose, you can never do too much research as a creator. Because even if you find a bunch of details that aren't going to be relevant to your story, they're still going to inform your view and your process. Whether it's how many samurai were actually women, to what the code of chivalry actually demanded from knights, to what gender roles were actually held by the Vikings (with men being beautiful and perfumed, and women being the heads of the household's finances), these little factoids can take your book in unexpected directions.

Additionally, a little extra research can often stop you from including debunked facts, outdated worldviews, or offensive stereotypes in your stories... and that's worth a little extra time hitting the books, don't you think?

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That's all for this week's Craft of Writing! For more of my work, check out my Vocal archive, or at My Amazon Author Page where you can find books like my cat noir novel Marked Territory, my sword and sorcery novel Crier's Knife, or my most recent short story collection The Rejects!

 

And to stay on top of all my latest news and releases, collected once a week, make sure you subscribe to The Literary Mercenary's mailing list.

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Paintings on The Ceiling (Why Your World Building Needs Immediacy)

Picture your story as a grand cathedral. There are gleaming tiles, niches filled with statues, and candles that shed light and provide ambiance. Subtle signs are left out, and ushers direct your readers to their proper places, ensuring they can follow along with the ritual of your tale. The acoustics lets your narration reach everyone, drawing them along in the wake of your story.

Your world building, in this case, is all around your audience. It's the smell of the wood polish, the quality of the light, the murals on the walls. However, most people who show up are there for the sermon, the grand tour, and the story you're telling. They don't show up to admire the walls, because they're just there to set the scene.

Sure, this is fun... but is this what matters right now?

That is not to say that all those details are not important to your story. But the question you need to ask is whether those are the things you should be focusing on?

Because if the elements you're pointing your readers' attention at don't matter to the story, then they have no immediacy. There is almost no faster way to lose someone's attention than that.

Paintings on The Ceiling

Give you an example of what I'm talking about with a conversation I had with a fellow creator a while back. Names shan't be mentioned, nor details given, as they aren't necessary to understand the point being made.

This person had their world all figured out. They'd laid out the ages of history, which parts were known and which parts were unknown, and what sorts of relics had been left behind. They understood the world's magic system, as well as what level of technological development was in which part of the setting. It made for a fun mixed bag of sci-fantasy, which was fun and engaging, giving the reader a lovely world to romp around in.

And if they'd just stopped there, they would have been fine. But the ball wanted to keep rolling.

No, really... you can stop building now...

Because, you see, there was not just a world but an entire cosmos at play here! There was space travel, and alien empires, and extraterrestrial organizations of cybernetic peace keepers, and all sorts of other cosmic craziness. And there was nothing wrong with any of that. It was fun, it was engaging, and it was interesting.

But it did not enhance the story that was being told. All it did was drag the focus off the primary setting (this fun little rock with it's odd nations that were one part post-apocalyptic badlands and one part nouveau medieval kingdoms with wizards and shotguns in them), and add a bunch of additional stuff that was just going to be a distraction.

All that other stuff was the fresco on the ceiling of the church. Sure it might be beautiful, eye-catching, fun, and filled with all sorts of amazing details, but if it isn't actually a part of the sermon you're there to listen to, all it's doing is making you tune out, lose focus, and miss big swaths of what's being said.

The Need To Know Basis

When you're writing a story, you only give out information on a need-to-know basis. You, as the creator, need to know all the little nooks and crannies of your world. If it's pertinent to you to know that the sword your protagonist found in a tomb was forged in fires heated with the bones of dead warriors, and the carbon that introduced into the process is where the steel developed such unusual properties for an iron age style setting, then by all means put that in your notes. But don't take time out of your book to have someone explain the intricacies of chemical changes during the forging of a blade if it is in no way relevant to your story, and it does not move your plot forward in any way.

I love this documentary, too, but don't waste the reader's attention.

This applies to basically all your world building; it needs immediacy in order for it to be relevant, rather than a distraction.

Now, that doesn't mean you should just ignore things that aren't on the straight path of your plot. If a major city is the headquarters of the Wyvern Knights, mention that. Have them flying around, or put one of two of them in the background. But don't step away from the story you're actually telling to give us a history lesson on that order, and on wyverns in the region if it's not germane to the story you're telling. If your setting has two moons, you should probably mention that during a night time scene, but don't go on for an entire paragraph about what those moons' affects on the planet are, or the mythology surrounding them if it doesn't affect your main cast and what they're doing. If there's a wizard in your scene, and they're doing wizard shit, describe what we see rather than giving us a big damn aside about how magic works in this world, unless you have a novice character receiving a lecture about it, and that lecture somehow fits into the journey that character is taking.

Everything, and I do mean everything should be in the service of immersing your reader into the story you're telling. Let them drink in the details, but remember that those details are not your story. They're stage dressing. They're atmosphere. Let them be that, instead of putting them in center stage so you can talk about them. Because unless these facts are important for the readers to know to understand what's happening, all you're doing is distracting them.

And if you do need to explain to your readers what's happening, don't just have your narrator do it. Work it into dialogue, build scenes around the learning process, or provide enough clues to pick up context. We don't need to know the intricate process of becoming the Sanctum Dominatus of the library, but we can probably figure out by the way other people react to the title that this person is serious business, and that if they are displeased with you then you're in a lot of trouble.

Like, Follow, and Come Back Again!

That's all for this week's Craft of Writing! For more of my work, check out my Vocal archive, or at My Amazon Author Page where you can find books like my sword and sorcery novel Crier's Knife!

If you'd like to help support my work, then consider Buying Me A Ko-Fi, or heading over to The Literary Mercenary's Patreon page! Lastly, to keep up with my latest, follow me on Facebook, Tumblr, Twitter, and now on Pinterest as well!

"Where Does The Poop Go?" is The Most Basic (and Ignored) World Building Question

When we sit down to build worlds, we tend to focus on the big, sexy topics. How does magic work in this strange, new world? What forces power the drives that let the Astro Navy reach the outer rims? How many social orders are there within this great dystopia, and what led to their savage struggles for dominance in the decaying world?

All of that stuff is important, no doubt. It's fun, it's engaging, and you're going to spend a lot of time on it. But there is another question you need to answer before you start writing. A question that a lot of us tend to ignore.

Where does the poop go?

Because until you know that, you don't know shit.

Why Does It Matter?

If you find yourself flabbergasted, asking why it is important to your story that you know where your world's bodily wastes go, chances are that it isn't. Unless you're pulling an It and having a monster who lives in the sewers, or you're going for a musketeer-style underground infiltration, it probably doesn't matter all that much to the narrative that you understand where all that excrement goes.

But from a world-building perspective, it is one of the most important questions. And it's far from the only one.

Okay, I'll bite... why?

How we deal with our waste is one of the fundamental questions of society. Do we have big, public engineering projects that deal with it (whether we're talking New York or ancient Rome, doesn't matter), or is it just a mad free-for-all where everyone just tosses it out the window? If the former, is the system old and crumbling (which could symbolize break-down in infrastructure), or is it well-maintained and sort of taken for granted? If the latter, does all this waste cause sickness? Or is civilization significantly far-out in the wilderness that you have plenty of room to fertilize the fields, as it were?

The way your world deals with poop is just one of the many nuts-and-bolts questions you should have the answer to. Even if that answer is, "It's set in 2011, so they have whatever modern sewer systems we're used to," you still need to have that answer.

This applies to all those niggling, homely questions you may not want to make time with, but which you still need to answer in order to give your world that bedrock foundation it needs. Questions about what people eat, what their hygiene is like, and if they put their pants on one leg at a time just like the rest of us do. Questions about who trades with whom, what commodities are valuable, and how certain items made it to the other end of the world. Especially if your story isn't set in a world that has Amazon Prime shipping, and a massive global trade network that links one end of the planet to another.

The ho-hum, everyday matters need to be examined, and decided upon, just as much as the big, world-shattering ones that typically inspire you in the first place. Because you are going to nail down those big questions completely. But it's the bolt with the missing nut that's going to trip you up in chapter 12, and leave you shouting at your screen.

Every. Single. Time.

That's all for this week's Craft of Writing post! Hopefully it got some wheels turning. If you've got a foundation question that you feel is just as important as where people poop in your world, then leave it in the comments below!

If you'd like to see some more of my work, check out my Vocal archive, or head over to My Amazon Author Page, where you can find books like my sword and sorcery novel Crier's Knife!

To stay on top of all my releases, follow me on Facebook, Tumblr, and Twitter! And if you'd like to support me, you can Buy Me A Ko-Fi, or go to The Literary Mercenary's Patreon page to become a patron today!

The Thousand Masks of God (A Writing Trick For Fantasy)

If you're a fan of fantasy, chances are good you've noticed how crowded the field of the divine can be. This can be particularly problematic in this genre because deities are assumed to be real forces in a lot of fantasy stories (particularly when their servants are the ones standing in as heroes or villains, and drawing their power from that divine source), and thus they represent a major force within the world.

There is an old trick regarding the divine, though, that you can use to clean up the field. I call it the Thousand Masks of God.

For who truly knows what the divine is?

What Is That?

The Thousand Masks of God is a simple idea, and it's one you've probably seen before if you're a fan of fantasy. It's the idea that there is only one set of gods (or sometimes only one god), and that these divinities appear to different cultures in different ways. Sometimes this is done on purpose (a divinity that appears as an old, bearded man to one culture, but a young mother to another), and other times it's human error (due to cultural differences, two very different people received two very different interpretations of the same being, and the same event), but the point is that there is actually a small number of divine forces at work in the world no matter how many different gods people think they're worshiping under different names.

Let's take a real-world example. Many cultures have a patriarch god in their pantheons; the Greeks had Zeus, the Norse had Odin, and so on, and so forth. Under the Thousand Masks of God, those patriarchs would all be the same divinity. While each might capture an aspect of him, they are just a hint of the true nature of that god. None are false, but each is only a singular aspect, seen through the lens of that particular culture.

What's The Purpose?

As a writing/world-building tool, this trick offers you a couple of different advantages. First and foremost, it means that you only have a handful of divinities to keep track of in your world's events and struggles. Secondly, it allows you the opportunity to give your characters (and through them your reader) a peek behind the curtain at pivotal, important points in the story (assuming you're going to reveal the true nature of the divine, which is a necessity if you're going to use this setup). Most importantly, though, this trick allows you to hand-wave away multiple pantheons or deities existing when their doctrine expressly says they're the only gods, or the only true gods.

That escape hatch comes in handy if you want to portray something like angels, demons, rakshasa, etc. in a way that seems to run counter to their presented mythology. Because if these beings, and those who control them, are only glimpsed through a mirror darkly, it's not always possible to understand their true motivations. Especially if you throw in Orange and Blue Morality on top of flawed human understanding.

To Be Clear, You Aren't Blowing Any Minds

That's your prose's job.

Every writer discovers the tools of the trade in different ways, and one of the most frustrating experiences you can have is thinking you've discovered something new and unique that's actually been done a thousand times before by writers you've never heard of. This trick is one of those things I thought most writers knew about, but there are always new folks coming into the fold who think this idea is groundbreaking.

Let me be clear, it isn't. Also, if you're concerned with being new, unique, and original, then writing may not be the career for you. Every story has been told before; the best you can do is hope to tell it in a new way that everyone really likes.

That's all for this week's Craft of Writing installment. If you liked it, and would like to see other examples of my work, then check out my Vocal archive. Also, don't forget to follow me on Facebook, Tumblr, and Twitter to get all of my recent updates and releases. If you'd like to support me you could Buy Me A Ko-Fi as a one-time tip, become a patron on The Literary Mercenary's Patreon page to become a regular, monthly tipper, or you could go to my Amazon author page to Buy My Books!

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