Original Fic Struggles - Worldbuilding
Jan. 12th, 2024 09:05 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
jajalalaI've been going to a writer's group every week which is super fun and good for my sanity, but even though I'm a fanficcer most the time I decided to work on original stories while at the group. For awhile I was working on a novella with a different format than I usually do--diary entries by a woman in a haunted house who slowly realizes her boyfriend might be the real horror. I finished a first draft for that (ignoring all my "[LOOK UP X]" notes anyway), and I think it was fun to do and a nice low-pressure project to work on in a room full of other people, but now I want to dive back into writing original stuff that has more of a traditional story structure. Also, the haunted house story was kind of heavy/real/depressing, so I want to go the opposite direction with something light-hearted and fantastical... and what's more fun than vampires and werewolves?
Over the holiday break we weren't going to writing group for a bit, so I rotated a werewolf/vampire concept in my head for awhile. At first I wanted to go as light-hearted as possible with some sort of romcom: A vampire and werewolf have to visit their respective families for the holidays, and the story is about the various cultural clashes the two groups have. However, I found as I was thinking of concepts that even though there were one or two scenes I could imagine well, there wasn't all that much of the "secret sauce" to the premise that compelled me. I like to have a concept that keeps a person turning the pages to see what happens next, and a couple going to visit each other's families isn't particularly high-stakes, at least not in the ways I was imagining. I tried to imagine that maybe one or both of them is trying to propose? So the meeting of families is a precursor to figuring out if they can marry into this family? Or something like that? But it still felt like a concept that didn't really "bounce".
So I tried to imagine the kinds of tropes/plots that keep me turning pages, and I thought it'd be really fun if the vampire/werewolf were fake-dating! I love the inherent tension in that kind of situation! But also I was imagining a modern world, and all the reasons I could think of for someone to bring a fake-date home for the holidays felt pretty convoluted, especially if I wanted to explore BOTH of their families at some point, like why would they BOTH need a fake date?
Basically no matter how I rotated it, I was like "this is a fun concept, but I can't imagine many riveting or high-tenison scenes".
Then finally, I was like "Wait. Let's just amp the tension entirely then. Let's put them in a space adventure!!!"
Once I gave myself permission to get more fantastical and raise the stakes and turn it into an adventure, things evolved in a much more exciting way. Now it's the story of a vampire and werewolf who hate each other, but are on a crew together because they both adore a particular human friend. When that human gets kidnapped, the two have to work together to save the human while traveling through various planets and trying not to kill each other (and falling in love along the way whoops <3).
The planet-hopping gives me a chance to do that cultural exploration stuff; I'm planning to have the two on a werewolf-centric planet and then a vampire-centric planet, which will allow both of them to get to know the other more deeply. I've also concocted a high-stakes reason for them to pretend to be dating at certain times ;) because let's be real it is one of my favorite tropes.
After introducing the space adventure aspect, all of a sudden I actually felt compelled to start outlining properly and really developing the concept/scenes. I have a moderate grasp on the overall arcs, and a pretty decent scene-by-scene outline of the first big arc (not counting the introduction/inciting incident). And I now have multiple "key scenes" in my head that I'm excited to write towards. So I think those higher-stakes were the secret sauce I was missing to really engage me with the story concept.
Now here comes the struggle: After so long of writing fanfic, I'm suddenly having to WORLDBUILD again and I'm like "uh oh.... how does one do this??" Fanfic has opportunities to build and develop on what's there... but there's something there already! I can reference a wiki! I'm not working from scratch, I'm just using what's there or adding my own elaboration/details on what already exists. It provides a great foundation and structure.
Now as I'm writing this original story, I'm struggling almost every step of the way. I know what I want scenes in general to look like, but I try to describe a person and I'm like "Wait what kind of clothes would make sense for them to wear considering the planet and the history of the planet they're from?" and then I'm also like "they're an insular society whose main export is trees, are they still using the modern tech/buildings of the people who originally touched down on this planet, or have they gone more towards letting go of that to build with the resources that they develop for themselves rather than trading? Or is it the high-technology disguised as aesthetic trees/cabins etc to create a cohesive image which maintaining tech advantages?" and there's not necessarily a "right"' answer but I have to make a DECISION about what I want it to be, but also I don't feel INFORMED enough to make that decision... and every decision affects every other aspect of the world/universe/society....
Auhgudihgduhg it's a lot of work! I've been writing and trying to put stuff down as I get to it, but the spontaneous decisions I make along the way kind of don't make sense when you examine them, so I need to take a pause and pin down some things, especially about the planets/cultures and the overall design/intent with the spaceships. Otherwise I'm going to keep writing a bunch of nebulous stuff that will have to be heavily edited later.
But I wanna wriiiiite not worldbuild :'(. Really it's just that I'm not used to worldbuilding, so I've started dragging my feet and getting hesitant. To develop as a writer, I'm going to have to bite the bullet and properly face this task to become stronger.
I've asked my dear roommate (an author who comes up with creative/unique and nicely developed worlds that aren't too overwhelming) to share some of her wisdom with me tonight, but do any of y'all also have any thoughts/advice on world building? If you have any advice for spaceship design that's a bonus, but I'm also in general trying to develop certain cultures/planets as well, so I think anything helps.
Over the holiday break we weren't going to writing group for a bit, so I rotated a werewolf/vampire concept in my head for awhile. At first I wanted to go as light-hearted as possible with some sort of romcom: A vampire and werewolf have to visit their respective families for the holidays, and the story is about the various cultural clashes the two groups have. However, I found as I was thinking of concepts that even though there were one or two scenes I could imagine well, there wasn't all that much of the "secret sauce" to the premise that compelled me. I like to have a concept that keeps a person turning the pages to see what happens next, and a couple going to visit each other's families isn't particularly high-stakes, at least not in the ways I was imagining. I tried to imagine that maybe one or both of them is trying to propose? So the meeting of families is a precursor to figuring out if they can marry into this family? Or something like that? But it still felt like a concept that didn't really "bounce".
So I tried to imagine the kinds of tropes/plots that keep me turning pages, and I thought it'd be really fun if the vampire/werewolf were fake-dating! I love the inherent tension in that kind of situation! But also I was imagining a modern world, and all the reasons I could think of for someone to bring a fake-date home for the holidays felt pretty convoluted, especially if I wanted to explore BOTH of their families at some point, like why would they BOTH need a fake date?
Basically no matter how I rotated it, I was like "this is a fun concept, but I can't imagine many riveting or high-tenison scenes".
Then finally, I was like "Wait. Let's just amp the tension entirely then. Let's put them in a space adventure!!!"
Once I gave myself permission to get more fantastical and raise the stakes and turn it into an adventure, things evolved in a much more exciting way. Now it's the story of a vampire and werewolf who hate each other, but are on a crew together because they both adore a particular human friend. When that human gets kidnapped, the two have to work together to save the human while traveling through various planets and trying not to kill each other (and falling in love along the way whoops <3).
The planet-hopping gives me a chance to do that cultural exploration stuff; I'm planning to have the two on a werewolf-centric planet and then a vampire-centric planet, which will allow both of them to get to know the other more deeply. I've also concocted a high-stakes reason for them to pretend to be dating at certain times ;) because let's be real it is one of my favorite tropes.
After introducing the space adventure aspect, all of a sudden I actually felt compelled to start outlining properly and really developing the concept/scenes. I have a moderate grasp on the overall arcs, and a pretty decent scene-by-scene outline of the first big arc (not counting the introduction/inciting incident). And I now have multiple "key scenes" in my head that I'm excited to write towards. So I think those higher-stakes were the secret sauce I was missing to really engage me with the story concept.
Now here comes the struggle: After so long of writing fanfic, I'm suddenly having to WORLDBUILD again and I'm like "uh oh.... how does one do this??" Fanfic has opportunities to build and develop on what's there... but there's something there already! I can reference a wiki! I'm not working from scratch, I'm just using what's there or adding my own elaboration/details on what already exists. It provides a great foundation and structure.
Now as I'm writing this original story, I'm struggling almost every step of the way. I know what I want scenes in general to look like, but I try to describe a person and I'm like "Wait what kind of clothes would make sense for them to wear considering the planet and the history of the planet they're from?" and then I'm also like "they're an insular society whose main export is trees, are they still using the modern tech/buildings of the people who originally touched down on this planet, or have they gone more towards letting go of that to build with the resources that they develop for themselves rather than trading? Or is it the high-technology disguised as aesthetic trees/cabins etc to create a cohesive image which maintaining tech advantages?" and there's not necessarily a "right"' answer but I have to make a DECISION about what I want it to be, but also I don't feel INFORMED enough to make that decision... and every decision affects every other aspect of the world/universe/society....
Auhgudihgduhg it's a lot of work! I've been writing and trying to put stuff down as I get to it, but the spontaneous decisions I make along the way kind of don't make sense when you examine them, so I need to take a pause and pin down some things, especially about the planets/cultures and the overall design/intent with the spaceships. Otherwise I'm going to keep writing a bunch of nebulous stuff that will have to be heavily edited later.
But I wanna wriiiiite not worldbuild :'(. Really it's just that I'm not used to worldbuilding, so I've started dragging my feet and getting hesitant. To develop as a writer, I'm going to have to bite the bullet and properly face this task to become stronger.
I've asked my dear roommate (an author who comes up with creative/unique and nicely developed worlds that aren't too overwhelming) to share some of her wisdom with me tonight, but do any of y'all also have any thoughts/advice on world building? If you have any advice for spaceship design that's a bonus, but I'm also in general trying to develop certain cultures/planets as well, so I think anything helps.
no subject
Date: 2024-01-14 05:47 am (UTC)maybe each time they land on a planet, you can flesh out that setting before writing the scenes in it. dedicate some daydreaming to it and then you can do the writing part, the part you want to do. this is easier said than done, and when i write the details of the setting grow into the scenes, but that's because i haven't written a story where the characters are travelling to many different places or planets.
no subject
Date: 2024-01-15 01:19 pm (UTC)(There are other planets I will need to write though.... I have not figured out their details yet XD)
Thanks for the advice!