Latest / Show, don't Tell Writing with Suzy Vadori / 109. Worldbuilding in Speculative Fiction (Part 1)

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109. Worldbuilding in Speculative Fiction (Part 1) · Show, don't Tell Writing with Suzy Vadori

• 0:05
  Welcome to the Show Don't Tell writing podcast with me, Suzy Vadori, where I peel back the layers of how to wow your readers with your fiction, your nonfiction.
• 0:13
  Anybody can bang out a first draft, but it takes a little more work to make your book as amazing as it can be.
• 0:20
  Join me as I share the step-by-step writing techniques you could apply to your writing right away, as I host successful writers who share a behind-the-scenes look at their own writing lives, and as I live coach writers on their pages, giving practical writing examples that will make your own writing stronger.
• 0:38
  Nobody is born knowing how to write an engaging book.
• 0:42
  There are real and important skills that you need to learn.
• 0:45
  On this show, I cut through the noise and get you all the info you need.
• 0:49
  I can't wait to see how this information is going to transform your writing This guest that I have here today is such a treat.
• 1:00
  When I was thinking about doing world building and then I ran into my good friend and fellow book coach, Gabby, at a conference in Denver, and we started talking about world building, I'm like, "You're the one I want to do this episode with." It is so exciting, and we talked so much that we actually turned it into two episodes, although we recorded it all in one sitting.
• 1:20
  It's a lot.
• 1:21
  So get your pen and paper ready, get your imagination ready, and come and geek out with us about world building.
• 1:28
  And Gabby is a fantasy writer, but world building applies to absolutely every single genre.
• 1:33
  We'll talk a little bit about that, and we will show you some ways to incorporate it into your genre as well.
• 1:38
  Just so that you know, Gabby has the chops to be talking about this.
• 1:42
  Her official bio states,"Gabrielle Keroack-Byrne writes and edits fantasy in the tangled wilds of the Pacific Northwest.
• 1:50
  She has a master's degree in literature from the University of Aberdeen, Scotland, and a second bachelor's in environmental studies from the Evergreen State College.
• 1:58
  Gabby loves Thai food, cats, anime, and talking about gelatinous zooplankton," and I promise you, we don't talk about that on this episode, although I probably should have asked her about it.
• 2:08
  She will 100%, according to her, name your pets if you let her, and when she's not reading, she can be found putting spiny beasties into books or fishing spineless beasties out of the Salish Sea.
• 2:20
  She's the author of middle-grade books The Rise of the Dragon Moon and The Edge of Strange Hollow.
• 2:27
  Gabby is represented by TS Ferguson and Zanshan Literary Agency.
• 2:31
  Please welcome our special guest, Gabby.
• 2:34
  Welcome to the podcast, Gabby.
• 2:36
  I am so excited when we planned this out about six weeks ago now- talking about world building and geeking out.
• 2:44
  Welcome.
• 2:45
  Thank you, Suzy.
• 2:46
  I'm really excited to be here, and I am super excited to talk with you about world building and fantasy and- All the things, right?
• 2:52
  And the things.
• 2:53
  For those listeners out there, we are going to focus a little bit on fantasy, but also world building in other areas, so don't stop listening.
• 3:01
  It, it's gonna apply everywhere, I promise.
• 3:03
  It applies to all stories.
• 3:05
  It applies to all stories- Really does… and even I would argue nonfiction, but that's a whole other podcast.
• 3:09
  Oops.
• 3:09
  No, I totally agree with you The tips that we're gonna share here today are gonna apply and make your writing so much stronger.
• 3:16
  Okay, so before we get going, let's be on the same page.
• 3:19
  Gabby, how do you def- like, what is world building to you?
• 3:23
  So, I mean, I think about world building as grounding the reader in a place, right?
• 3:31
  And that place might be teeny-tiny, like a basement that is locked perpetually, or it might be an, a city, or it might be an entire planet.
• 3:41
  Depending on what you're writing and depending on who you're writing it for, that's gonna dictate how much detail goes into your story, and it's gonna be dictated by your character's journey, by their arc, by their arc of change.
• 3:54
  And I like to think of the world as a character.
• 3:58
  I don't know- Me too.
• 3:58
  Me too where I first heard that, but it stuck with me, and it really aligns with sort of my own belief in life that we are all in sort of a relationship with the world around us.
• 4:10
  And so if you treat your world like it's a character, it becomes richer, it becomes stronger, it becomes more impactful, and it taps into your own author heart, which can add a lot of richness and compelling energy to your story.
• 4:25
  Oh my gosh.
• 4:26
  I, I love all of that.
• 4:28
  I totally agree.
• 4:29
  I treat a lot of things like characters.
• 4:31
  Yeah.
• 4:31
  Personify everything in the- Yeah… and, and, and because Like, there is a world building arc. And I wanna talk about magic later in the podcast.
• 4:41
  Sure, yeah.
• 4:41
  So let's … We won't do a deep dive right now, but magic I also like to treat as a character, right?
• 4:46
  Yeah.
• 4:47
  And, and so as it comes about.
• 4:48
  But let's talk about, so world building we often think about science fiction, fantasy, speculative, like, uh, that whole category because you're creating something that maybe doesn't exist.
• 4:59
  But let's talk about world building, like, do we need to do it in other books?
• 5:03
  I mean, the answer is yes, but what other genres, and how does that work?
• 5:08
  I mean, to me it's about layering in sensory details.
• 5:14
  It's about establishing rules for your world, and that- Wow … obviously that applies to the magic system too, but, but it applies to the world that you're moving through, right?
• 5:24
  And if you just compared, say, like, a World War II romance with an alternative post-Nazi win world, right?
• 5:37
  You're gonna have a lot of familiar things, but also a lot of really strong differences that come through in the way people function in that world or don't function in that world, and in the power structures and the belief systems.
• 5:52
  You know, all of those things sort of layer upon each other to create a world that a character moves through.
• 5:59
  Yeah, absolutely.
• 6:00
  And if you're sharing sensory moments and you're sharing interactions within that space over time, as opposed to, like, talking about something happening elsewhere in the, in the world or in the city or whatever, like it's happening right now to your character in that moment, that's world-building.
• 6:17
  Yeah.
• 6:17
  Absolutely, and I think, you know, you touched on a lot of it, but if you're writing hist- like, in some, in some genres it's more prevalent or more important than in others, but it exists for all of them, right?
• 6:29
  Right.
• 6:30
  So for example, historical fiction, you were talking about, you know- Yes … having a war movie or something, hopefully that's in the past.
• 6:36
  Mm-hmm.
• 6:37
  Um, I think we've got, we've got some current day things happening as well.
• 6:39
  Current as well.
• 6:40
  Uh, we don't get political here on the Show Don't Tell podcast- No, no … but just to be, you know.
• 6:44
  But, you know, we've got historical, we've got locations.
• 6:47
  We, we read fiction in particular to walk a mile in somebody else's shoes, and so let us do that and build it.
• 6:54
  Yeah.
• 6:54
  But in some, some spaces it might be way more important depending on how far away it is from your reader's own experience to concentrate on the world-building.
• 7:04
  But it's still important even if you had a contemporary novel- To understand what it might be like to live in somebody else's brain, and their, and their house, and their job, and all of the things Right.
• 7:15
  Those are all world-building.
• 7:17
  Yeah.
• 7:17
  Yeah.
• 7:18
  Okay.
• 7:18
  And I mean, even to the extent, like, the, it's in the micro, right?
• 7:21
  It's in the really little details, and that's not to say you should be giving all the details, right?
• 7:28
  You have to be selective about what you share.
• 7:31
  But what you know, you can build that as much as you would like, right?
• 7:34
  You can know all kinds of things.
• 7:36
  I know that my character's shoes are almost worn out, and they're really smelly, and she's uncomfortable in them, right?
• 7:43
  And that dictates how she walks right now, and that dictates how her neighbor is gonna come over to her and see if she's okay.
• 7:51
  Yeah.
• 7:51
  Because she's limping down the road in her weird shoes, right?
• 7:54
  I was gonna say, 'cause she could smell her shoes from- Because she can smell her shoes, yeah.
• 7:57
  And then she's gonna be standoffish,'cause she doesn't want her neighbor to get too close to her because she stinks, right?
• 8:02
  And- I love … Middle Grade is amazing.
• 8:04
  You know?
• 8:05
  Details through shoes is, like, a whole thing.
• 8:07
  I love it.
• 8:07
  Love it.
• 8:08
  Yeah.
• 8:08
  I mean, that could be a dark apocalyptic zombie book too, right?
• 8:12
  Like- Yeah… if that detail is important, and it then you're, that's, the- you've done something really important.
• 8:20
  Yeah, exactly.
• 8:22
  And you talk about grounding, and, you know, I use that in so many different contexts.
• 8:25
  But yeah, it's about giving the reader a couple of really, I like to say sharp and unique- Mm-hmm … specific details, right?
• 8:33
  Sharp and unique.
• 8:34
  Specific details.
• 8:35
  Not generalizing.
• 8:37
  And, and so that we can focus on that.
• 8:39
  Honestly, like the way that my brain works, I'm just sitting here thinking about stinky shoes.
• 8:43
  I can actually smell them.
• 8:44
  I won't stop you.
• 8:45
  It's, it's like very strange.
• 8:47
  I'm kind of on that other opposite end of the visual spectrum.
• 8:50
  We need to move to apple trees.
• 8:52
  Yeah.
• 8:53
  Apple trees.
• 8:53
  Oh, lovely.
• 8:54
  Olfactory system.
• 8:55
  It was funny, for those of you who listen to, oh, actually I don't think it's aired yet, but it will have aired by the time we do this, that I have an amazing, amazing interview with Sam Scholl on- Oh, nice on suspense and creating suspense, and I actually kept lightening the mood during that podcast.
• 9:11
  So go and listen to that one, it's hilarious.
• 9:12
  She kept, you know, painting the scene about this window behind us and somebody looking, and I couldn't stand it 'cause we were doing it in person and I'm like, I'm, I'm actually scared- That's a perfect example and it drives me nuts.
• 9:22
  That's a perfect example- It's nuts… because she was giving you a small piece of a world, right?
• 9:29
  Like- Yeah … it's a piece of a house.
• 9:30
  The house belongs to somebody.
• 9:31
  And a villain on the outside.
• 9:32
  Whoop, scary.
• 9:33
  Yeah.
• 9:33
  Right.
• 9:33
  And so that, that detail is so wonderful for creating a mood, for sharing an important idea about what you're reading and what you're gonna experience and who this person is that you're residing in for the story, right?
• 9:48
  Like- Yeah… it's all relationship.
• 9:51
  Yeah.
• 9:51
  There's a reason that I have a show don't tell podcast, and it's 'cause I absolutely love it.
• 9:56
  So world building.
• 9:57
  So some writers love world building, and I love what you said about so, so much that they open their books with volumes and volumes and volumes, and then some people are like, oh, resist doing it 'cause they think it feels cheesy or weird, or they read a book in the past where it has 42 pages to start with on the description, right?
• 10:15
  That's not what we're talking about here.
• 10:17
  But I love what you said that you the writer, listeners listen up, you need to know a lot more than you share.
• 10:24
  And so how do you recommend, because there's so much advice out there that talks about word count and all these things.
• 10:31
  People will be like, "Oh, I was exploring my thing, and I just wrote three chapters on my world." And like, that's not, I, I wish you could see Dani's face'cause she's horrified by that.
• 10:40
  But you can't count it as word count.
• 10:42
  So how do you recommend that writers back their way into this?
• 10:46
  Or, or how do you treat that?
• 10:48
  How do you do it?
• 10:49
  Yeah.
• 10:50
  So th- this is just a little, a little trick I like to use for myself, right?
• 10:56
  So if you consider your world a character, a- an actual person, and then you consider how you, say you have a brother or a best friend or a mom, whatever- Think about what you know about that person.
• 11:10
  Like, if you really think about what you know about that person, you know a lot of stuff about that person who is dear to you, right?
• 11:17
  I can't tell you all of it, but yeah.
• 11:19
  You can't tell me all of it, nor would I want to know all of it, right?
• 11:22
  I shouldn't tell you all of it.
• 11:24
  No, you should not.
• 11:25
  But if you met me in an elevator and we got to talking and I said, "Yeah, you know, my brother is, we're fighting right now.
• 11:33
  We don't get along very well, you know, but w- do you have a brother?
• 11:35
  What's he like?" And you are gonna tell me what your brother is like In relation to what you know about my story, right?
• 11:46
  And it works the same way in world-building, right?
• 11:48
  You're going to share what the reader needs to know in that situation to move forward, and it's not gonna be everything you know.
• 11:58
  But the more you know, the more you speak with authority, right?
• 12:02
  The more you speak from a place of experience, and that comes through in your tone and in, and in the prose it comes through.
• 12:10
  It's very strange.
• 12:11
  I ne- uh, it's s- I- it lives in a metaphysical place, right?
• 12:15
  Like, this magic of knowing a lot and conveying a little, but somehow it comes through that you know so much about your place.
• 12:23
  Yeah.
• 12:24
  Okay, there's two things that I wanna talk about from what you just said.
• 12:27
  I'm like, my mind's exploding, so good.
• 12:30
  So you just told me that I could do an elevator pitch of my world, and I-'cause th- that's the whole scenario.
• 12:38
  Like, I come from the business world.
• 12:39
  I worked- Yeah … on Wall Street.
• 12:41
  I helped companies develop, like, I bought and sold companies.
• 12:45
  That was one of my jobs.
• 12:46
  And helping them develop, quote-unquote, their elevator pitch.
• 12:49
  So if you're coming from business, dear listener, think about, I've never connected those two things, which is exactly what you just said.
• 12:58
  You're riding up in an elevator.
• 12:59
  You've only got, you know, four floors to tell somebody about your company.
• 13:03
  What, what do you say?
• 13:05
  What's important in context, right?
• 13:06
  What do they need to know?
• 13:08
  What is the best case scenario?
• 13:09
  So you've just, like- Where are you trying to get them to, right?
• 13:12
  Yeah, you've just- Like, where are you trying to- … blown my mind in connecting two concepts that I've been working on, like, in two very separate careers my whole life- I love it so that's very, very cool.
• 13:21
  But the second thing that you said is this piece about the fact that if you know more and you know tons about your world, you speak with authority, and that magic piece.
• 13:32
  And I gotta tell you that, and you can probably do this too with your clients' work, but when I go through my clients' work, I can tell if they don't know.
• 13:41
  And I'll say, "Hey, looks like you didn't decide this yet." And they always, they say the same thing all the time.
• 13:46
  I love you, all the listeners, and all my clients, but you say the same things, which is, "How the heck did you know that, Suzy? How can you al- how do you always call me out on the one thing I haven't decided?" And it's exactly what Gabby just said.
• 14:00
  Because if you don't know the answer, you use vague language, and you do not speak with authority.
• 14:05
  You do not step into your own light.
• 14:07
  You do not feel confident, and you write that way And it's very difficult.
• 14:12
  I know there's a lot of it … I like to debunk a lot myself there.
• 14:16
  I've already, like, ixnayed the, you know, count all your words, and- Right.
• 14:20
  Yeah… but I'll say as well, this idea that writing and just put a pin in it and keep writing if you haven't decided, I actually don't agree with because if you don't decide, you will write the most bland scene you've ever written.
• 14:36
  It will have vagary all through it.
• 14:39
  Yeah, I will call you out on it.
• 14:40
  Yeah.
• 14:40
  The problem is when you go to edit it, when you decide, you won't see that you need to put it in, and you won't notice that it sucks, right?
• 14:48
  Yeah.
• 14:48
  So it's better to, you know, if you come across those decisions, I like to step away and make the decision or do that work on your world somehow.
• 14:58
  Well, if it's a key pivot point especially, right?
• 15:00
  Yeah.
• 15:01
  Like, if it, if it's really … And it, and it probably should be if you're writing in scene, right?
• 15:05
  Yeah.
• 15:05
  Um, something really important to that character's journey.
• 15:07
  I agree with you, and I think that, you know, the only exception is if you are one of those very, very rare writers who's like, "I am absolutely comfortable with writing a terrible draft." Yeah.
• 15:20
  "I just need words on a page, and I'm fine with revising it 10 or 15 times because I know I'm not gonna get it right." Right?
• 15:27
  Like I think we- 10 or 15 times, but hear that, listeners.
• 15:30
  Yeah.
• 15:30
  Like we're not saying, okay, but kill your darlings in 10 or 15 times.
• 15:34
  I do know writers who leave world building until last, and some of them are extraordinarily successful- Uh-huh.
• 15:40
  I believe that … um, who will- It can be done … you know, who write three or four books a year and are traditionally published and have deadlines.
• 15:45
  They will- Really?
• 15:46
  Yeah.
• 15:47
  I have, have, uh, a couple of writers I know that will actually give a very, very drafty book with no world building at all, because they're just trying to show the editors what they're trying to do.
• 15:58
  They'll write- Yeah … all the dialogue first- Yeah … or something.
• 15:59
  But- Yeah… but they're gonna go But, but don't- Well, and presumably they have a- Yeah … a body of work that shows that they know how to do that, right?
• 16:08
  That they know- Yeah … how to backfill a world in a way that- But they don't write it poorly.
• 16:12
  They just skip- Right … it entirely.
• 16:14
  That's a good point.
• 16:14
  Because if you write it poorly and try to go back and fix it, it's hard.
• 16:18
  Um- It's super hard, and you will miss things, and you will- Yeah … miss, I think m- more than anything else, you'll miss opportunities to have, like, really powerful emotional moments for your characters because often, at least in my experience and with my clients, like, the, once you have something on paper, it's difficult to move away from it, right?
• 16:39
  As opposed to- Yeah … like thinking something through and trying to find, maybe brainstorming, doing a list of, like, of opportunities and options.
• 16:46
  Like, can I add a shark?
• 16:47
  Is there a, is there a place here where- That's how Sharknado was born.
• 16:51
  That's how Sharknado- I-… was born.
• 16:53
  But you're looking- Can I add a shark?
• 16:54
  for those playful opportunities.
• 16:56
  I think the right question was should I add a shark?
• 16:59
  But I don't know.
• 17:00
  When should you not add a shark?
• 17:02
  When should you not add a shark?
• 17:03
  I don't know.
• 17:04
  That was a very successful franchise, bizarrely.
• 17:06
  Yeah.
• 17:07
  Great.
• 17:07
  So where in the writing process should you make these decisions, explore your world?
• 17:13
  What, what, what do you recommend?
• 17:15
  I mean, it can be anywhere, but what do you see working- Yeah … the best- Yeah… for yourself and for your clients?
• 17:18
  Well, as you've pointed out, like, there's a million different ways to do world building, you know, from starting from scratch and building your world before you start writing, to doing a framework and starting writing, to, you know, sort of building backwards from your plot.
• 17:33
  There's, like, a million different ways to do it.
• 17:35
  For me, what I recommend is that sort of scaffolding framework.
• 17:40
  You know the things that are intrinsic to your story and to your character's journey, and you know- I think the things that impact systems I think is really important.
• 17:53
  You know, especially if you're writing for a, an adult audience, this is even more impactful.
• 17:58
  It's true for kid stuff too, but, but I think especially when you're dealing with more complex economic systems, spiritual systems, power structures, those all interact with your world and with your characters, right?
• 18:12
  And how they move in your world.
• 18:14
  And so understanding those very complex interactions and the way those different systems, the magic system's another example, right?
• 18:23
  How those systems work on your character is, you can't not understand that.
• 18:29
  So we've just thrown out a whole bunch of stuff.
• 18:31
  I wanna break it down.
• 18:33
  Yeah.
• 18:33
  Um, and it, 'cause it's important, so don't get overwhelmed if you're listening to this going, "Woo." Yeah, no.
• 18:37
  There, there's a lot of decisions to make, right?
• 18:40
  Correct.
• 18:40
  There are a lot of decisions to make.
• 18:42
  Have fun with it.
• 18:43
  This is part of the beauty of being … I mean, my very favorite genre to read and to edit, I say this a lot, is historical fiction.
• 18:52
  However, I do not write historical fiction.
• 18:54
  Thank you very much to those who do write historical fiction- Correct'cause I am not- It would be fine … I am not interested in taking somebody else's world.
• 19:02
  I write fantasy because I get to make it all up, and I- Mm-hmm … don't have to research- Mm-hmm, mm-hmm … and I get to use my very broad imagination, and I get to- Yeah … solve complex issues.
• 19:12
  Um- Yeah … but I really, really love being immersed in, and I, I love to edit it because I will look it up and make sure and, you know, all the things 'cause I wanna make sure it's all consistent.
• 19:22
  But we have to make a lot of decisions.
• 19:23
  But the first decision, I'm gonna throw this one out there, and then I wanna talk about all the other decisions that we have to make- Yeah … because the very first decision that I usually offer to writers, especially if they're writing fantasy or science fiction, is this book taking place on Earth?
• 19:40
  Some other alternative.
• 19:41
  And I don't mean the planet Mars or something, I just mean is it Earth as we know it?
• 19:45
  You could still have fantasy before I get like a whole bunch of comments like, "What are you talking about?" You could still have fantasy.
• 19:51
  My books are mostly magical realism where they take place on an Earth that, that is exactly, you know, the way that we expect it- Yes to be, and yet- And the- … there's this magical, and yeah, and the, but there's this magic layer on top, right?
• 20:04
  Mm-hmm, mm-hmm.
• 20:04
  But so once you've answered that question- Yeah… which is an important one, and one, it, then it feels not consistent.
• 20:15
  So make sure- Well- … you answer it… yeah, and that question of genre like number pro- probably your number one question, right?
• 20:24
  Yeah.
• 20:24
  Am I writing an epic fantasy, which would, which would be another place, another world, another reality, right?
• 20:32
  Am I writing- Yeah … an alternative reality where it's very Earth-like?
• 20:36
  And, and the thing is, anytime you're writing fantasy and anytime you're writ- you're doing any kind of world building, it's a combination of, of patterns, right?
• 20:44
  That people recognize patterns.
• 20:45
  It's gonna be combining the familiar with the unfamiliar.
• 20:49
  Yes.
• 20:49
  So you're sort of asking yourself what percentage of this world is familiar, and what percentage is unfamiliar?
• 20:56
  And that dictates like where, what kind of world you're in, what kind of story you're writing to some extent.
• 21:02
  Yeah.
• 21:02
  And then you follow your character through their journey, and that will, that will tell you what you need to share about the world.
• 21:09
  Exactly.
• 21:10
  And I mean, you're speaking my language here.
• 21:12
  There was-- I worked with a coach on, about 15 years ago, on my very first draft of the books that I initially-- of, of the first book that I initially published, which is The Fountain.
• 21:22
  But I just remember, 'cause it, there's time tra- like essentially time travel.
• 21:28
  Hmm.
• 21:28
  There's not actual time travel.
• 21:30
  It's not science fiction, but because there's a magic that erases history in it, it essentially follows a lot of the same things as time travel.
• 21:39
  And, you know, this coach is amazing.
• 21:41
  He's written so many time travel novels, which is why I chose him, and he said to me, "Well, you can't change everything because you'll just like-- You know, you can't suddenly say a chair is no longer a chair and a floor is no longer a floor, and I mean- Right you'll tire your readers out." So the- Yeah … I love what you just said, what percentage of it is familiar?
• 22:01
  We're gonna keep, even if it's not on Earth, so you've gotta keep some things tethered to what we know or, or this book is gonna be really terribly overwhelming and boring, right?
• 22:14
  Um, if you're gonna reinvent everything.
• 22:14
  Right, because you're gonna be, you have to spend all your time explaining yourself.
• 22:17
  But sleep is no longer sleep, and eating is no longer eating, and ceilings are floors and floors are ceilings.
• 22:24
  No, no.
• 22:24
  Right?
• 22:24
  You have to ground your reader in the familiar, right?
• 22:27
  Because y- in what they know.
• 22:28
  This is what they mean when they say write what-- You know, they're not telling you you have to write about your, your terrible breakup, but they're telling you to write from a place of integrity in yourself, right?
• 22:38
  Like, I have these feelings, these emotions that I feel in relation to this coffee still being warm, right?
• 22:46
  Like in relation to being in my own home, in relation to talking to you, Suzy, right?
• 22:52
  And those feelings are grounding because they're familiar to other people too.
• 22:56
  They're universals, right?
• 22:58
  And so writing about those, or near universals we could say, right?
• 23:03
  So, so writing from that place of the familiar in a place that is unfamiliar or partially unfamiliar is, that is the nature of walking the world-building line, right?
• 23:14
  Between sharing what you need to share and knowing other things that you don't need to share.
• 23:20
  Yeah.
• 23:20
  Okay.
• 23:21
  Absolutely.
• 23:22
  And I, I just wanna say, you know, I want to encourage everybody listening to write that breakup scene' cause I would love to read it.
• 23:29
  Yes.
• 23:29
  I- No, go ahead.
• 23:30
  Write the breakup scene.
• 23:32
  I, I once, I once wrote a breakup into one of my books, and you'll never read it because it didn't survive.
• 23:37
  It was actually something that was, when I sent it out to beta readers, I sent it out to half adults and half teens, 'cause I write YA, and the adults, to every single one of them said it was the best scene, and the kids all said it was the worst scene.
• 23:53
  And because that pain translates, right?
• 23:56
  The pain is what translates Yeah.
• 23:57
  Yeah It, it, even if the breakup situation is different from other people's breakup situations- Yeah … the pain of it, the loss of it, that is the integrity, that's the theme I actually wanna go back and read it because I wasn't, I wasn't t- I wasn't teaching writing now then.
• 24:14
  Uh-huh.
• 24:14
  But I wanna see what about it, like the kids would say, I mean, I'm known for sweet romance in my teen novels, right?
• 24:21
  And so breaking characters up, and I had to, like, I literally deleted five chapters to work around it because I had to have them never get together so that they didn't, 'cause they couldn't be together, so but they couldn't break up.
• 24:35
  Apparently it was too powerful, and the kids all said that it was so sad they had to put it aside and they weren't sure they could finish And the parent, and the adults were all like, "Bring it." And anyways, I'm really curious now.
• 24:46
  I have no idea what the scene was about.
• 24:48
  I kind of remember, like, the situation,'cause it was, like, one of those things where I just wanted to have, like, it was at a bar or something, right?
• 24:55
  Where they weren't supposed to be, and, like, the setting was really vivid.
• 24:59
  But I'm curious now to see if it actually is any of my stories.
• 25:03
  I'm not sure.
• 25:04
  I, I, I definitely wasn't aware of it if it was, but it probably is why it was so good.
• 25:09
  Anyways, okay.
• 25:10
  So- So no, I mean, uh, uh, funnily, uh, your, what you were just sharing, t- I totally, I have no idea- Totally off-topic.
• 25:16
  No, not- N- no … not off-topic, right?
• 25:18
  I flashed, I flashed to the Star Wars bar.
• 25:21
  When you said it took place in the bar, I was like- Oh, interesting… oh- Like Jabba the Hutt … it's like the Star Wars bar.
• 25:25
  Because in that scene, right, that iconic movie scene- Yeah… we are, we recognize the world, right?
• 25:34
  E- even though it's packed with so many different kinds of creatures and so many different kinds of stories, you know that bar has 18, 20, 35 books worth of stories in it, all those different characters, right, all those different species.
• 25:50
  Yeah.
• 25:51
  But that's not the story.
• 25:52
  The story is these guys come through this bar, and hey, look, it's a bar just like on Earth, right?
• 25:57
  Yeah.
• 25:57
  There's music.
• 25:59
  People are being jerks.
• 26:00
  People are drunk.
• 26:01
  People are sharing information.
• 26:03
  People are sharing secrets, right?
• 26:05
  It's a bar, and so that is familiar to us, and it grounds us there even though everything else is totally different.
• 26:12
  Yeah.
• 26:13
  Yeah, I love that.
• 26:14
  And, you know, that universal or that familiar moment, oh, so good.
• 26:20
  Okay, so we've talked, okay, so we kind of threw a whole lot at the listeners.
• 26:25
  I wanna break this down.
• 26:27
  There's so much we could talk about, but okay, so we're talking about location and, you know, is it Earth?
• 26:32
  Is it not Earth?
• 26:33
  Is it this?
• 26:33
  Is it that?
• 26:34
  Is it in a bar?
• 26:35
  We're talking a lot about location, and that is a big piece of world building, but there's so much more than that.
• 26:41
  Mm-hmm.
• 26:42
  I mean, we've discussed a few of them- Yeah … and I wanna deep dive.
• 26:46
  You just talked about creatures, right?
• 26:48
  Yeah.
• 26:48
  That's world building.
• 26:49
  It is.
• 26:49
  And I know that's a big piece of the world in your books, right?
• 26:53
  Yes, it is.
• 26:54
  Yeah.
• 26:54
  Is, is creatures, and I gotta tell you, I love creatures, and I, every time I outline a fantasy book, I put creatures in it, and then I write the book, and the creatures never appear in the book, 'cause it's like just- That's not it … not my thing.
• 27:07
  And I mean, I don't have pets.
• 27:09
  I don't have a lot of experience with it, and so again, it's write what you know.
• 27:13
  I'm like, ooh, creatures are really hot right now.
• 27:15
  I should do something different.
• 27:17
  And then I outline them.
• 27:18
  They're part of my world building.
• 27:20
  They're part of my brainstorming.
• 27:21
  They're in the outline, and they just don't come.
• 27:25
  They just don't come.
• 27:27
  So yeah, I mean- Tell me a little about that… it's a microcosm of, of world It's a combination of the familiar and the unfamiliar.
• 27:35
  You know, they should, as you have just noted, be involved in your plot in some way, invo- you know, in relationship with your characters in some way to be in your book.
• 27:44
  They, you don't … I've, I've read a lot of fantasy where reader, where writers are putting in odd creatures just to put in odd creatures, and sometimes they'll just have, like, a, a funny name, or they're just passing them on a walk or something like that.
• 27:58
  And really, most of the time, unless you're deep, deep in a scene, there's no, there's no meaning there for creatures that are just- Yeah … to idly- And I think that's the problem is I was just kind of not- Uh-huh… really into it.
• 28:11
  I just wanted them there.
• 28:12
  Yeah.
• 28:12
  And then, and then I, I knew that as I was writing, and so I didn't actually- But it can be fun, and it can be challenging try to challenge myself, yeah.
• 28:20
  But, you know, I mean, I think you take, there's a whole literal world full of historical and mythological creatures that are familiar to us.
• 28:32
  Like, if you look at just the breadth of vampire novels, dragon books, every, basically every creature under the sun has that history that you can draw from.
• 28:41
  So that's one type of way to build a creature- Yeah … is to build it on- And I love what you just-… what we know, right?
• 28:46
  Yeah, exactly.
• 28:47
  You, y- again, some of it's familiar- Mm-hmm … but yet fresh, right?
• 28:51
  Like, you're bringing your own van- Yeah … my vampire sparkle is no longer fresh, but it was at the time, right?
• 28:57
  It was so fresh at the time.
• 28:59
  You know, and then- Yeah … when I wrote my dragon book, right, Dragon M- Rise of the Dragon Moon, I had, we had not very long ago learned that dinosaurs had feathers.
• 29:09
  Yeah.
• 29:09
  You know?
• 29:09
  And there's a whole school of thought that, uh, a lot of dragon stories and dragon mythology comes from some kind of unknown interaction between dinosaurs and people, right?
• 29:20
  Which I'm not necessarily advocating for that as a theory or not, but it, these were all things sort of playing around in my head, right?
• 29:26
  And- Okay, I, I actually had somebody in high school say to me, "Well, but in The Flintstones, they're there, and they wouldn't lie to children, so they did absolutely exist at the same time." And I was like, I didn't, I, I don't think I even argued with them.
• 29:39
  I have a really visceral memory as a small child of having to take a nap and being frightened.
• 29:46
  It, it was shadowy, it was dark.
• 29:48
  I, and I j- I, maybe I had read something or seen, so anyway, I was spooked, and I didn't want to go to sleep because I was scared.
• 29:54
  And then I thought to myself, "Well, if monsters are real, then so are the Super Friends, and they will come and take care of this, so go ahead and nap. You're good. You've got this." You are such a writer.
• 30:07
  I love it.
• 30:08
  If this, then this.
• 30:10
  Yeah.
• 30:11
  So- Okay.
• 30:12
  Okay, so look- … combining the familiar and the unfamiliar Thanks for tuning in to the Show, Don't Tell Writing Podcast with me, Suzy Vidori.
• 30:24
  It is my absolute honor to bring you the straight goods for that book you're writing or the book that you're planning to write.
• 30:31
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• 30:35
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• 30:44
  That's how other listeners will find us.
• 30:46
  Also, visit Suzyvidori.com/newsletter to hop on my weekly inspired writing newsletter list, where you'll stay inspired and be the first to know about all the upcoming training events and writing courses that happen in my community.
• 31:01
  Want my eyes on your writing?
• 31:02
  Submit a page of your current draft for a chance to come on the podcast at the link in the show notes.
• 31:08
  I'd love to chat with you about your writing in my always positive, incredibly supportive way so that you can make great strides towards your writing goals.
• 31:17
  I'm here to cheer you on.
• 31:19
  Remember, that book you're writing is gonna open doors that you haven't even thought of yet, and I can't wait to help you make that it the absolute best it can be.
• 31:29
  See you again right here next week