Dissecting World Building

            The creation of just about any fictional works – be it book, short story, movie, or game – begins with the world building. Certainly, some need less than others; a real world setting requires less than a fantasy setting, but world building still needs to be done to create a convincing world for any story to take place in. A world is a huge thing though – and the idea of building one can be daunting.

            So, how do you tackle building a world without investing years in it? Well, the first part is to remember that you don’t actually need to create a whole world – you just need to make enough of it to make it look like you have. Like the two-dimensional facades stereotypically used for movie sets, all you need is what the audience will see – plus a little bit extra to hint at so they think more had been done.

            Take characters, for example. Each character you intend to present needs to be well thought-out and designed to be realistic, but you only need to make the characters that will be part of the story. Creating the entire population of a city would be tedious an exhausting, so how do you make it seem like the rest of the world still exists? Throw in a few names, and references to events that take place outside the story. It could be as simple as a character commenting on a paper written by someone notable – you don’t have to worry about the identity of the person, or what the paper says, beyond what the commenter needs for their line. The details don’t matter – the fact that someone was given a name and did something noteworthy that has nothing to do with the story makes the world feel more real.

            The same works for places, and is even easier. Just make up a place name, like Drexa’s. The characters a talking, and someone comments on something that happened at Drexa’s, or perhaps suggest it as part of a list of places to go. The reader has no idea what the place it. A restaurant? A club? It doesn’t matter, because the characters know, and it makes the world feel bigger than it is.

            When world building, it’s important to keep to the essentials. What’s important to the story? What do you, as the writer, need to know to maintain consistency within the story? If you aren’t going to use it, don’t worrying about making it – all you need is a hint; enough to make the world seem like it has more depth.

            Of course, if you enjoy building the world and want to go ahead and flesh out every little detail, go ahead and do that, too! Just keep in mind that, if you start to get overwhelmed by the size of your creation, you can always step back and do less. There’s a reason for the saying, “Less is more.” If you ever find out you don’t have enough, you can always add more later – just make it one little piece at a time and, before you know it, you’ll have a healthy little world of your very own, ready for whatever use you put it to.

Check out my YouTube channel where I tell the stories of my D&D campaigns.

Click here to find the charity anthology containing a couple of my short stories.

Also, make sure you check out my wife's blog and her website.


If there's any subject you'd like to see me ramble on about, feel free to leave a comment asking me to do so.

Unstoppable Creativity

            You’d think I would have learned by now. Because I haven’t, I’ve now broken my cardinal rule. That’s right, I’m working on more than one book at a time.

            It may not seem like such an important rule. Loads of people work on more than one book at once, so why is it such a big problem? Well, it’s a problem because it gives the writer an excuse to not finish a project. The Dark Lord of the Alliance of Worldbuilders is a prime example – he’d written 100,000 words or more in a single month (wow!) and yet, to my knowledge, he had never completed a book (we all give him a hard time about it).

            Now, in my case, I couldn’t help starting a second project. As I mentioned a few blogs back, I’m currently working on rewriting a project. Apparently, after seven years of writing every day, rewriting isn’t enough of a creative outlet for my brain. After a while, an idea surfaced that I couldn’t resist – so now, here I am, splitting my writing time between two projects when I should be focusing on one.

            It just goes to show that creativity is a habit. Once you get into it, you just have to keep going.

            Feel free to take that as encouragement to build a creative habit – or a warning to avoid doing so. Whichever suits you best.

            Either way, know that you can’t stop the creativity. Creators must create.

Click here to find the charity anthology containing a couple of my short stories.

Also, make sure you check out my wife's blog and her website.


If there's any subject you'd like to see me ramble on about, feel free to leave a comment asking me to do so.

Artistic Judgement

            One of the fun (here, fun means “horrible”) things about being an artist – no matter the medium – is an inability to judge the quality of your own work. Or, rather, we can judge our own work, but we do so on a scale of Dreadful to I Guess It’s Kinda Okay.

            When I was just out of high school, and still fairly new to making chainmaille, I made a project that was my then-crowning achievement. It was a chainmaille vest made using a pattern known as elf-weave – one of the most complicated chainmaille weaves in existence. The shirt has over 100 hours of work in it, and looks great. But it has a flaw in it. Somehow, while I was making it, I managed to combine two rows into one, losing half a row.

            Even though the flaw isn’t visible to anyone not looking for it – and someone without excellent pattern recognition skills is unlikely to spot it – it is very hard to see. But to me, the creator, that tiny flaw is a horrible oversight, all but ruining the shirt.

            Talk to any artist and they’ll tell you similar tales. Ask them about a specific project and they’ll be able to tell you every flaw in minute detail. This line is out of place, that note was performed slightly off, and that part that goes in should have gone out but it couldn’t be fixed without destroying the whole thing.

            Each new created piece of artwork that manages to meet the artist’s approval is the best piece they’ve made to date – in fact, it’s so good, it makes all the previous pieces rubbish. Not that it’s any good....

            I think that this harsh self-judgement is part of what pushes artists forward, encouraging them to strive to improve their craft and make more projects. But, at the same time it’s disheartening, because nothing is ever good enough. People may shower our work with praise, but can’t they see that flaw right there? They must be lying.

            What is it that makes a creator so hard on their work? Seeing all the minute details that they had to be aware of in order to create it. An outside observer – even other artists – didn’t painstakingly draw each line, write each word, or link each ring together. As such, they look at the whole – the completed project. They don’t see the mistakes, because they have no idea that they are mistakes. They’re too busy being distracted by everything that was done right to notice what was done wrong.

            A valuable lesson that all artists should learn is how to step back from the project and observe it without their artistic lens. It is true that we must always strive to better our art, but sometimes we need to step back, look at the whole, and appreciate what we’ve accomplished. Otherwise we may forget how well we’re doing and give up.

Click here to find the charity anthology containing a couple of my short stories.

Also, make sure you check out my wife's blog and her website.


If there's any subject you'd like to see me ramble on about, feel free to leave a comment asking me to do so.

Writers and their Characters

            Writers, by necessity, must have a very complicated relationship with their characters. It’s not as simple as creating them and then throwing them in the story. No, you have to care about them and hate them at the same time.

            You see, it’s essential for a writer to care about their characters. If the writer doesn’t care about the character, neither will the reader. It shows in the writing. Oh, there are ways to make it look like you care about a character when you don’t, but they are contrived and lessen the reader’s connection to the story. Actually caring is the only way to organically transfer the feeling into the writing.

            That said, if the writer cares too much, it creates another problem. It makes the plot fall short, because the writer isn’t willing to have (as) bad things happen to their characters. The character also tends to have less flaws. The result is that the character strolls through their trials with ease, never truly losing anything, never being forced to make a difficult decision.

            The solution is that the writer must hate their character with a fiery burning passion. Feeding on that hatred, the writer can throw obstacle after obstacle at their character, laughing maniacally all the way. The character will make mistakes and lose friends, precious possessions, limbs, or even their lives. And the story will be interesting.

            However, if the writer hates the character too much, then the character will lose their depth and the reader won’t be able to connect. If the character becomes nothing more than a bland punching bag, waiting for the next blow to fall, the reader will lose interest and likely walk away. So, the writer must care deeply about the character.

            It’s all about balance. You need to be able to care about the character so much that is shows through in the writing, while hating them so much that you can put them through the worst ordeals of their lives. You must be able to cry as their souls are crushed, even as you’re squeezing tighter.

            A writer must have a relationship with their characters worthy of writing a story about.

Click here to find the charity anthology containing a couple of my short stories.

Also, make sure you check out my wife's blog and her life coaching website.


If there's any subject you'd like to see me ramble on about, feel free to leave a comment asking me to do so.

So You Want to be a Writer?

            There are two tips that you will come across repeatedly while doing research on writing, usually in conjunction with each other: read a lot and write a lot. More than anything, these are the two things that will shape all writers.

            The later is self-explanatory. “Write a lot” walks hand in hand with “practice makes perfect”. No one in the world can just sit down and write a perfect book the first time. Like any art, it takes time to learn not only skills, but how to tap into your innate talents and develop your unique voice.

            I, myself, am amazed at the drastic improvement I see in my own writing. Each time I complete a book, I find it hard to believe I wrote the previous one. A more tangible example is the best-selling author Terry Pratchett. All you have to do is read The Colour of Magic and compare it to any of his later titles. It’s hard to believe they were written by the same person.

            As for reading a lot, it seems to be obvious, yet at the same time it can often feel counter-productive. During the creative process, our brains naturally regurgitate what they've absorbed and it sometimes feels like we’re accidentally imitating someone else’s work. It does happen to a certain extent; I remember reading Christopher Paolini’s Eragon for the first time and being able to pick out some of his favourite authors (I looked it up later to be sure I was right). However, imitation is the first step in learning. When learning to speak, we imitate sounds before we understand the meanings of words. When learning to write, we learn the letters prior to understanding how they’re used.

            The benefits of reading when you’re a writer are endless. It’s important to know what else is out there, plus it’s a great source of inspiration. More than that, though, it is how writers learn and improve. As you begin reading books as author, you learn to look at them a new way. You take a step back from simply enjoying yourself and analyse deeper. If you find yourself drawn into a book, you ask yourself, why? What has this author done to affect me so? You look more closely at the characters to see how they’re made to seem realistic, at the plot to see how it progresses and twists, at the words to increase your vocabulary, and at the style to see what you like and dislike.

            Much of the time, the learning is on a subconscious level. Other times, you find yourself searching for the secret that makes a good book so good.

            I've recently started reading Robert Jordan’s The Wheel of Time series and I came across something I've never seen before (or, at least, never noticed). A lot of authors build tension by keeping secrets from the reader. What’s that lurking in the shadows? Where is the villain? Who is the villain? Jordan did the opposite: he gave, what I felt, was too much information. It wasn't quite enough to tell exactly who the traitorous allies of the protagonists were, but it was enough to make me reasonably certain – while still leaving just enough doubt. It wasn't until characters were trustingly being led into what I was sure was a trap that I realized what he’d done. He’d given me enough information to guess the truth, but held back enough that I had to read on to be certain.

            And so, my repertoire of writing tricks grow, and I become a better author through reading. For those others out there aspiring to be writers, I shall reiterate the advice you will hear over and over again. Read lots. Write lots. You’ll amaze yourself at how much you improve.

Click here to find the charity anthology containing a couple of my short stories.

If there's any subject you'd like to see me ramble on about, feel free to leave a comment asking me to do so.

Teaching D&D

            I always enjoy watching people learning to play Dungeons & Dragons for the first time – which is what I was doing tonight. A friend of mine works in a store that is going to start running the official Wizards of the Coast gaming sessions and tonight, in preparation, he was running a game for new players. He asked me (as an experienced player) to come along to help advise the new players.

            The important thing to know about D&D is that it’s a storytelling game, specifically designed to give the players as much freedom as possible. As such, it can be a little complicated to learn – but the hardest thing to learn, I feel, is that you’re allowed to think outside the box and bend the rules to suite your needs.

            The best story I have to describe this involves a game I was playing that was run by the same friend. I had encountered a door that, to get through it, my character had to will himself through – becoming part of the door before passing through. So, I asked that, if my character could will himself to become part of the door, couldn't he also will the door to be part of him? After looking shocked for a moment, my friend agreed. My character absorbed the door and walked around, able to manifest a door at will.

            That’s the sort of game D&D is – anything goes and, in a society built around such solid rules, that’s a hard thing to learn. This group of players did a splendid job, however. At first, they stuck to the mechanics of the game, but while they were in a room with what sounded like an army coming after them, they became more and more creative in finding ways to secure the area. They started with trying to wedge a knife under the door to keep it shut and eventually tried using an ice spell to freeze the doors together.

            The best part is I hardly had to suggest anything. All the players picked up the game quickly and flowed right into it. A lot of credit needs to be given to me friend running the game – he taught the basics and prepared brilliantly for working with new players (if I ever teach a new group again, I’ll take a leaf out of his book). The end result was everyone had fun and there are now a bunch of new people hooked on D&D.

            I bet we could get a lot more outside-the-box thinkers in the world if more people played D&D. Maybe we should teach it in schools. Ah, if only I were the ruler of the world...

Click here to find the charity anthology containing a couple of my short stories.

If there's any subject you'd like to see me ramble on about, feel free to leave a comment asking me to do so.

World Building

            One of the most important parts of writing is world building. It doesn't matter where a book or story is set; the writer needs to know the world inside and out.

            Some world building is easier – for example, a book set in the real world tends to need very little creation, although it does require more research. Other times, world building can be challenging – like a book set in a fantastical city in another world where the various people and establishments are critical to the plot.

            What I chose to do is, in hind sight, nearly impossible (at least for one person) and exceptionally challenging. I decided to build an entire fantasy world, the same size as ours (or, at least, close enough).

            Why is this task so difficult? Try to picture our entire world. Can you name all the countries and their capitals? What are the diplomatic statuses between each country? Where are the trade routes and what do the countries trade?

            Those are the easy questions. There are a whole lot of other details to come up with as well, like plants and animals unique to the world or ones that appear in other books and mythology that have their own twist in this world. Famous historical figures and locations. Religions, cultures, societies, politics, regional moral standards. The list goes on and on.

            Luckily it can be cheated, at least to a certain degree. Do I really need to know about unicorns if they don’t appear in the book I'm working on? No, I can leave that until I actually need it. But the more that is developed in the world, the easier it is to add flavour.

            Recently I decided that it was high time (after four and a half years and books of writing in this world) that it was high time I named the months and days of the week in my world. It seems like a relatively unimportant task, but now that it’s done I can actually set my characters’ birth dates in stone. Plus, whenever I feel like naming the day or the month in which the story is occurring, I'm ready to do so. I may even go back and add them into the books I've written, adding a new depth to the realism of my world.

            Of course, that whole process opened up a whole new can of worms for me, because now I'm working on the moon cycles. It sounds easy enough – and it was. For the first moon. However, following in my footsteps of craziness, I decided that the moon has a couple moons of its own. Now I'm working on coming up with the rotation patterns of those moons, trying to find a pattern that will allow me to have an easy reference for when I'm writing.

            It’s a good thing that I found a program for making my own encyclopaedia. I have the right mind for storing all this information, but having it all written down and organised in one place has made my writing infinitely easier.

            Nevertheless, let this be a lesson to you. If you want to build a world, start off small or you might find yourself drowning in the oceans of your own creativity.

Click here to find the charity anthology containing a couple of my short stories.

If there's any subject you'd like to see me ramble on about, feel free to leave a comment asking me to do so.

Minecraft - the new Lego

            When I was a kid, my brother and I used to love playing with Lego. It was one of the best toys out there – at least for us, because after we’d built a Lego set, we could take it apart and create.

            Our different personality types were very evident, even back then. My brother’s constructions often focused on creating vehicles, while I was busily building castles, fortresses and forts for us to play with our Lego men in.

            Of course, as always happens, we grew older and we stopped playing with Lego. Our vast collection got packed up in a big plastic bin and is now sitting unused in a closet at our parents’ house.

            In more recent years, the same style of creativity inspired by Lego has come back into my life, in a far less messy platform. Minecraft.

            This is a video game that was created by a small company called Mojang. Minecraft is a game where your character is dropped into a randomly generated world made up of blocks. What then? Well, then you do whatever you feel like.

            You can harvest blocks, craft tools, build structures and mechanisms, mine, explore the infinite world, explore monsters. Oh, yes – monsters. In survival mode, one of the first things you learn is to build a house as quickly as you can, because at night, the monsters come out to play.

            This game, so simple in appearances, has grown to be one of the most popular games out there. Why is that? Because it allows people to explore the same creative side that Lego does. Find the blocks you need and build whatever you please!

            Creativity is an integral part of the human mind and, to many of us, we feel stunted if we can’t express that creativity. Minecraft provides a unique outlet, similar to Lego blocks, that has gripped the world’s imagination. You need look no further than a simple search on Google or YouTube to find examples of the brilliant things people have done.

            I can’t truly say that Minecraft has replaced Lego – although it comes close. For one thing, you can’t make vehicles, so my brother won’t play it. It does, however, cut down significantly on the mess and sore feet.

            Naturally, such a similarity has not been missed by others. For those who enjoy both Minecraft and Lego.... There are also Minecraft Lego sets and Lego texture packs for Minecraft. Sometimes I love this world.

Click here to find the charity anthology containing a couple of my short stories.

If there's any subject you'd like to see me ramble on about, feel free to leave a comment asking me to do so.