An Exchange of Words: David B. Coe’s Weblog

Today’s post, “My Shiny New Toy,” can be found at http://magicalwords.net.  Check it out, and enjoy!

Finally finished the new story I was working on.  I’ve put it away for a while, as I do everything I write.  I’ll read it through eventually, make some changes, and then figure out where to send it.

It was a fun piece to write, in part because it was set in the new world I’ve created for the next series I plan to write (after I’m done writing the last of the Blood of the Southlands books).  It began as a simple story, a chance to work out some worldbuilding mythology.  It wound up as much more — a key incident from the past of the series’ lead character.  In writing it, I learned a tremendous amount about him, and about a secondary character as well.  Even if I never sell the story, it’s already accomplished what I hoped it would.

Writing short fiction serves so many purposes, even for someone who considers himself almost exclusively a novelist.  I’ve said this before in various venues, but it bears repeating.  Writing short fiction can teach you a great deal about your characters, about your world.  It can help you develop an authorial voice for a larger project.  And it gives you material to sell while you’re writing your novel, which can facilitate the marketing of you book.  If you’re stuck on a part of your book — you can’t get past a problem you’re having — step away from the novel and try writing something unrelated about one of the characters.  Chances are the process will jar something loose and get you past that roadblock.  No one ever has to see the short piece.  But you’ll see it, and chances are you’ll learn from it.

That’s my two cents for the day.

Today’s music:  Nanci Griffith (One Fair Summer Evening)

As my friend Stephen Leigh mentioned in a reply (on livejournal) to my previous post on worldbuilding, I begin the worldbuilding process the same way he does:   with a map.  

Why?  Part of it is that I’m pretty visual — I like to have the physical layout of my world in front of me as I work out other issues (history, religion, economics, culture, politics, etc.).  I find that having that physical context fixed in my mind facilitates the more abstract elements of worldbuilding.  Another reason may be tied to my academic background.  I have a degree in environmental history, and what sets environmental historians apart from others who study history is our focus on the ways in which climate and terrain and the distribution of natural resources combine to shape human behavior.  By creating that map, by setting those environmental parameters, I allow my world building to be guided by those same physical forces.

I’ve also found over the years that the process of labeling a map, of giving names to the physical features I’ve created, actually fires my imagination and helps me fill in the back story — the history — of my world.  Look at any map of our real world, and you’ll find a huge variety of names.  Some, clearly, are sourced in physical characteristics of the place in question –  Mountain View (where Nancy and I lived as grad students), Larchmont (where I grew up).  But other places are named for historical figures or events or for the people who founded them.  And everyone of those names suggests a story.  So as I name places in my worlds, I also develop histories for those names, and those histories, in turn, give depth and texture and flavor to my new world.

That’s what I’m doing now.  The outlines of my map are done.  I’m naming now, and as I do, I’m finding stories.

Today’s music:  Johnny A. (Sometime Tuesday Morning) 

I have an idea for a new series.  

I’ve written two books of my current trilogy and will begin the final volume in another couple of months.  But before then I want to have this new project mapped out, so that I can hit the ground running when I’m ready to give it my full attention.  I might even write a few chapters of the first book before I go back to write volume three of Blood of the Southlands.  We’ll see.  I’m a good distance away from that right now.

But today I get to start worldbuilding.  I’ve already done a bunch of this in my mind.  I know a good deal about what the world will look like physically, on a map; I’ve started to think about its politics and religions, it’s economics and its history; its customs and, of course, its magic.  I’ve jotted down notes and started some research.  Before now, though, I’ve done these things on the side, in between more pressing projects and responsibilites.  Now I can concentrate on learning about this new place.

This will probably sound strange, but I feel the way I do before leaving on a trip to somewhere new.  Worldbuilding for me is a process of discovery as much as it is a process of creation.  Just as my characters often surprise me as I write, taking my narrative in directions I hadn’t expected, my fledgling worlds often surprise me as I begin to delve into them.

It’s been a while since I did this last, and I’ve missed it.  I created the Forelands universe nearly seven years ago, and though the Southlands are different from the Forelands, and so demanded that I do some worldbuilding before starting the trilogy, it was still the same universe, the same magic, the same basic rules. 

Today I sit before a blank page.  I can take this world anywhere I want.  

I love this part of my job.

Today’s music:  Jerry Douglas (The Best Kept Secret)