Haly's taking on the biggest misconception about worldbuilding and dishing out tips to help you overcome your fear of not knowing everything about your world so you can start worldbuilding today!
"Writing about a second home." Very poetic, and very true.
I remember that advice now. It's very good.
An excellent point, one I am actively cleaning up from not following fully. In my defense, the world grew quickly before I realized how much maintenance is involved.
I'm glad the move has progressed as much as it has for you. And I'm glad some semblance of Worldbuilding Wednesday is back.
As for how much worldbuilding is enough, without being too much...worldbuilding should almost always do double duty of either exposing character or advancing plot, and preferably through sensory details.
Abby could feel the clinging stench of rain-moist roses in the back of her throat. She wanted to gag, bit her tongue to keep the bile at bay, and tasted hot copper instead.
Betty indulged in the fragrance of roses on the rain and imagined herself in a rosewater shower. She spun in delight, letting the drizzle paint her exposed skin.
So, yeah, fun fact about me…I'm that bitch who screams “Girl, it's a trap! Don't go help the goat! What the fuck is wrong with you?!” at horror movies (in this specific case, it was one of the Purge movies that we accidentally saw on the wrong screen at the drive-in).
Moments like that are, in fact, why my family will ONLY watch horror with me at home or at the drive-in.
You have fun facts? I only have horrible disappointing truths. Like, you know, I'm a pedant when I don't mean to be and I'm probably out of my mind, and everything ends in a digression that's only very tenuously connected to whatever I'm talking about someone with.
So, when I think, the first three Purge movies were out, I'd not seen any of them. And it was 2015, leading into the election of Trump. Me and my moms decided for the 4th of July (real patriots over here) we'd binge watch all of the movies in one go.
Since then I've been an honest to god FAN of the franchise, which is just fucking cheesy but I have no regerts.
*back hook kicks a face from the other tag team in the jaw, stiff, the crack echoes on television, but that's because part of the fluourish of my kicks involves slapping my pants to make the fantastic crack noise, and they stumble back and take a classic dive flip over the top rope to the floor*
I'm also way too into this wrestling bit we have going on. *sprays green mist in the air, static cam zoom in on my face lookin' all crazy.*
Tag
*Climbs the top turnbuckle instead of getting in place, moonsault onto the face who just tumbled onto the mats outside the ring. He rolls out of the way, I hit pad and sell it for all it's worth. "OH MY GOD! EMIL OTTOMAN GOES FOR A MOONSAULT TO THE FLOOR AND EATS CONCRETE!"*
*the raging advance of a mixed-tag jobber named Jayne Dough is stopped by Haly's palm to her face. Held at arm's length, she is little more than a pink costume, flailing blonde hair, and windmilling arms as Haly continues firing off a reply to DW's comment and question, in a clear and obvious put-up of why she's 'the tits.'*
Oh, I'm enjoying the fuck out of it. I think it's going to make things easier in the near future, too, as the community begins The Inevitable Social Division that comes with any social structure. We all band together under one big umbrella, then glom onto tiny, ridiculous differences--such as pantser vs. plotter or MFA vs non-MFA or ink vs. pencil--about which we get unreasonably tribal.
*Here, a generic Corey Graves knock-off takes a moment to remind the home audience that Haly used to work as a social media dev for the now defunct Napalm Riot, and knows a tiny bit about eeeevvvverrrrrry fucking thing...which is why...SHE-IS-THE-TITS! And in the ring, she's busy delivering a trio of chops to Jayne accompanied by an OO! OO! OO! from the ringside crowd*
I figure if I can get you and Thaddeus to write sardonic, satirical slash pieces on whatever ridiculous bullshit is going on....
*She grabs Jayne Dough by the hair, spins her around so that her back is against Haly's front, and then delivers a SHARP-ASS diamond cutter with a thunderous SLAM that would bring a tear to even the Viper's eye!*
We drive up the hype and the drama with our back-and-forth promos...because not only are those FUN they're FUCKING POPULAR AS FUCKING TITS....Then at the end of the day I come in and point out all of the ridiculousness like a true fucking punk. Every so often, y'all team up and surprise me somehow. I mean....*IF* you can....
*Haly takes advantage of a dazed Jayne Dough to get around and wrap her legs around the other woman's, then pulls in her core and lifts and LOCKS IN A FULL FIGURE EIGHT OH MY GOD JANE IS WRITHING AND... JAYNE... DOUGH... TAPS.... OUT! And there's the bell! And the Ottoman Cuntpire remain the Substack Mixed Tag Team Champions!*
Now the next question. How much world building is too much? Saying that someone only needs enough to advance the story might be too open ended. I have a story who's MC has a driving motivation for a lot of the stuff he does. I wrote his story without knowing the source of his motivation but now I'm filling it in.
It could be argued that I just as easily could have written the prequel before the main event. But then I could have written the prequel-prequel and so on.
Condoulations! You are the first of my "students" to graduate into Advanced Worldbulding.
Everything is related, everything is connected, every story is just the next chapter of what came before and the preview of what comes next. There is no beginning, there is no end, there is only this "imaginary" place that you "made up" but that is also somehow...a living, breathing, reality with its own history and cultures and future and dreams. It feels like you have a direct bridge into another realm, and the writing is so much easier, overall, because you're writing about a second home.
Where to start and end worldbuilding is as simple and as complex as where to start and end your story: it really just depends!
My seventh-grade English teacher gave me a piece of advice that lives with me to this day, and is probably the #2 piece of advice that I give. Ahem! Your worldbuilding should be "like a lady's skirt: long enough to cover the subject, and short enough to entice the imagination." He gave us that advice when asked for a word count target on an essay...but it applies to so much.
You've been writing enough stories, books, and serials--all set in the same world--to understand why I keep *insisting all the fucking time* that having a reliable way to keep track of not just your worldbuilding, BUT HOW IT IS ALL CONNECTED, is critical. (I know you know this, DW, but other people will read this. I want them to learn, too, before they get to the place where they have to start doing a Lucasfilm-style retcon.)
The good news is, you haven't outgrown my help. The bad news is, your non-specific questions aren't going to help you, you need to ask much more precise questions about very specific things.
Nice!
"Writing about a second home." Very poetic, and very true.
I remember that advice now. It's very good.
An excellent point, one I am actively cleaning up from not following fully. In my defense, the world grew quickly before I realized how much maintenance is involved.
I'm glad the move has progressed as much as it has for you. And I'm glad some semblance of Worldbuilding Wednesday is back.
As for how much worldbuilding is enough, without being too much...worldbuilding should almost always do double duty of either exposing character or advancing plot, and preferably through sensory details.
Abby could feel the clinging stench of rain-moist roses in the back of her throat. She wanted to gag, bit her tongue to keep the bile at bay, and tasted hot copper instead.
Betty indulged in the fragrance of roses on the rain and imagined herself in a rosewater shower. She spun in delight, letting the drizzle paint her exposed skin.
*you can’t know everything
tag
tixed that for you.
slow blink. stare.
So, yeah, fun fact about me…I'm that bitch who screams “Girl, it's a trap! Don't go help the goat! What the fuck is wrong with you?!” at horror movies (in this specific case, it was one of the Purge movies that we accidentally saw on the wrong screen at the drive-in).
Moments like that are, in fact, why my family will ONLY watch horror with me at home or at the drive-in.
yag
You have fun facts? I only have horrible disappointing truths. Like, you know, I'm a pedant when I don't mean to be and I'm probably out of my mind, and everything ends in a digression that's only very tenuously connected to whatever I'm talking about someone with.
So, when I think, the first three Purge movies were out, I'd not seen any of them. And it was 2015, leading into the election of Trump. Me and my moms decided for the 4th of July (real patriots over here) we'd binge watch all of the movies in one go.
Since then I've been an honest to god FAN of the franchise, which is just fucking cheesy but I have no regerts.
*back hook kicks a face from the other tag team in the jaw, stiff, the crack echoes on television, but that's because part of the fluourish of my kicks involves slapping my pants to make the fantastic crack noise, and they stumble back and take a classic dive flip over the top rope to the floor*
I'm also way too into this wrestling bit we have going on. *sprays green mist in the air, static cam zoom in on my face lookin' all crazy.*
Tag
*Climbs the top turnbuckle instead of getting in place, moonsault onto the face who just tumbled onto the mats outside the ring. He rolls out of the way, I hit pad and sell it for all it's worth. "OH MY GOD! EMIL OTTOMAN GOES FOR A MOONSAULT TO THE FLOOR AND EATS CONCRETE!"*
*the raging advance of a mixed-tag jobber named Jayne Dough is stopped by Haly's palm to her face. Held at arm's length, she is little more than a pink costume, flailing blonde hair, and windmilling arms as Haly continues firing off a reply to DW's comment and question, in a clear and obvious put-up of why she's 'the tits.'*
Oh, I'm enjoying the fuck out of it. I think it's going to make things easier in the near future, too, as the community begins The Inevitable Social Division that comes with any social structure. We all band together under one big umbrella, then glom onto tiny, ridiculous differences--such as pantser vs. plotter or MFA vs non-MFA or ink vs. pencil--about which we get unreasonably tribal.
*Here, a generic Corey Graves knock-off takes a moment to remind the home audience that Haly used to work as a social media dev for the now defunct Napalm Riot, and knows a tiny bit about eeeevvvverrrrrry fucking thing...which is why...SHE-IS-THE-TITS! And in the ring, she's busy delivering a trio of chops to Jayne accompanied by an OO! OO! OO! from the ringside crowd*
I figure if I can get you and Thaddeus to write sardonic, satirical slash pieces on whatever ridiculous bullshit is going on....
*She grabs Jayne Dough by the hair, spins her around so that her back is against Haly's front, and then delivers a SHARP-ASS diamond cutter with a thunderous SLAM that would bring a tear to even the Viper's eye!*
We drive up the hype and the drama with our back-and-forth promos...because not only are those FUN they're FUCKING POPULAR AS FUCKING TITS....Then at the end of the day I come in and point out all of the ridiculousness like a true fucking punk. Every so often, y'all team up and surprise me somehow. I mean....*IF* you can....
*Haly takes advantage of a dazed Jayne Dough to get around and wrap her legs around the other woman's, then pulls in her core and lifts and LOCKS IN A FULL FIGURE EIGHT OH MY GOD JANE IS WRITHING AND... JAYNE... DOUGH... TAPS.... OUT! And there's the bell! And the Ottoman Cuntpire remain the Substack Mixed Tag Team Champions!*
Now the next question. How much world building is too much? Saying that someone only needs enough to advance the story might be too open ended. I have a story who's MC has a driving motivation for a lot of the stuff he does. I wrote his story without knowing the source of his motivation but now I'm filling it in.
It could be argued that I just as easily could have written the prequel before the main event. But then I could have written the prequel-prequel and so on.
How do you detect mission creep?
Condoulations! You are the first of my "students" to graduate into Advanced Worldbulding.
Everything is related, everything is connected, every story is just the next chapter of what came before and the preview of what comes next. There is no beginning, there is no end, there is only this "imaginary" place that you "made up" but that is also somehow...a living, breathing, reality with its own history and cultures and future and dreams. It feels like you have a direct bridge into another realm, and the writing is so much easier, overall, because you're writing about a second home.
Where to start and end worldbuilding is as simple and as complex as where to start and end your story: it really just depends!
My seventh-grade English teacher gave me a piece of advice that lives with me to this day, and is probably the #2 piece of advice that I give. Ahem! Your worldbuilding should be "like a lady's skirt: long enough to cover the subject, and short enough to entice the imagination." He gave us that advice when asked for a word count target on an essay...but it applies to so much.
You've been writing enough stories, books, and serials--all set in the same world--to understand why I keep *insisting all the fucking time* that having a reliable way to keep track of not just your worldbuilding, BUT HOW IT IS ALL CONNECTED, is critical. (I know you know this, DW, but other people will read this. I want them to learn, too, before they get to the place where they have to start doing a Lucasfilm-style retcon.)
The good news is, you haven't outgrown my help. The bad news is, your non-specific questions aren't going to help you, you need to ask much more precise questions about very specific things.