Where

Where what, you might be asking me?

Where? Where is your story set? Where does it take place? Where do the characters go to get their stuff for the story?

Where?

I’ve seen a lot of questions in forums from people asking for help with world building. World building depends on the type of story you’re working on. World building is also not limited to any one type of genre, as some may imply. For a lot of people, world building implies sci-fi or fantasy where the place of existence for the story is not anything that is already known. That would certainly sit at the far edge of world building. World building is the Where.

However, world building covers any story you want to write. It’s easy to say that a story takes place in a certain city that exists. What if the reader doesn’t know much about that city? As a writer, we have to build the world so that our readers have a sense of place.

Having said that, I’ve just realised that I’m contradicting myself. The book I released in November 2018, has a contemporary setting, which is just a few years beyond the time of writing. Whilst it is set in a certain city, I haven’t necessarily over-built the where. I have talked about other factors, primarily the pending political change that is about to happen. I did create fictional places within known locations, which no doubt will confuse any locals.

Then there is the world of my nine-book series. I started working on the series over twenty years ago and in that time, it has changed a few times. The worlds I’ve built have not been complex, only time consuming. For that series, I’ve created a set of calendars to go with the time frame for the primary planet that isn’t Earth. I’ve even created a font that belongs to one of the other civilisations. I’ve created islands; the continents for the new Earth colony planet; political banners; time and dates, hence the calendars; travel between the planets; and so on.

There were, and possibly still will be, times when the Where of that series takes me away from writing the series. For me I have to know as much as I can about the Where so that I can write with confidence and believability. For one of the books, I’ve even spent time trying to find the right parts for, and create, a physical model that is a representation of something in the book. (I have settled on the medium for that model now.) Unfortunately, every time I changed the design of the model, I had to change the story. I think I’ve come to a stop with the changes now. If I do make a change, it’s minor, as I will only chastise myself over and over for changing the story, again.

Where is important for your story. If you don’t know Where the story takes place, it may make it difficult to effectively work the story to success. I believe that anyway.

Where is very important for my stories. I have to know the rules of the Where so that the characters can live, survive, and interact within that Where. Probably slightly more relevant for the sci-fi/fantasy genre, but relevant none-the-less.

Discover the Where for your story.

Know the Where.

Live in the Where.

Be the Where.