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Use Worldbuilding to Create Your Story’s Setting

As creating your story’s setting, you might use the technique of worldbuilding.

Worldbuilding occurs when you construct an imaginary place and time in detail. Such a setting could be as small as a single room or as large as the multiverse with alternative timelines. Usually it is a single planet or region of a world, however.

Examples of settings that underwent worldbuilding in some form include: Westeros from George R. R. Martin’s fantasy series A Song of Ice and Fire; Stephen King’s Derry, Maine; Dante’s Inferno; and William Faulkner’s Yoknapatawpha County.

Worldbuilding mainly is used in fantasy and science fiction as the settings of such novels and short stories often are entirely made up. Still, even if placing the story in a real setting – even if it existed in the past – fully imagining that world will help you convey it in a more realistic and dramatic way.

This world must be so authentic that it could exist independently of the story itself. To achieve that, the world you create must have internal and external validity. Internal validity means the world within the story is consistent. For example, if you’re able to sail to another land in a couple of days, later you shouldn’t say that this same land is 1000 miles away. Doing so would be contorting the setting to fit your plot. External validity means that the world could actually exist. For example, in science fiction you wouldn’t have large dinosaur-like creatures on a high-gravity world. Our understanding of biology and gravity suggests that aliens on a world larger than Earth would be more stout to withstand the pressure of gravity pulling them downward.

Authors take a variety of different approaches to worldbuilding. Usually, though, authors should consider, and hence build, the following elements of their world:
• Location in universe (star type, arrangement of solar system)
• Climate/biome/terrain
• Biology of your species
• Culture (religions, government, history, economics, art, law, linguistics)
• Technology/magic

One good approach to use is to begin building the culture in which your story’s character lives. For example, that culture’s religion might worship two gods, while your main character believes there is only one god, a major point of conflict in the story. This raises the question of how a two- vs. a one-god religion might compare and contrast in their beliefs. How would this affect the way these religions govern and their laws? Further, why would a culture worship two gods? Does the planet have two stars or two moons? Maybe two bright stars in the night sky are extremely close to the solar system? In this way, from culture you move to location in the universe, which in turn would affect the biology on the planet. For example, plants probably wouldn’t be green on a world with a red sun as photosynthesis would work better for black leaves.

All of these elements can affect your characters in a story – the law she breaks, the way she is tried in a court, the way the night sky looks to her, descriptions of the food she eats, and so on.

To achieve internal and external validity requires a multidisciplinary understanding of your world. While you don’t need to be a physicist or a biologist to build a world, you’ll probably need to do a lot of research on these topics as constructing your world. Such research is part of the fun of worldbuilding! Indeed, some people enjoy worldbuilding without ever drafting a story set in their creation.

There are a couple of guidelines to the craft of worldbuilding. First, the world you create should serve a purpose. Specifically, it should allow for conflicts to occur, for the plot to move forward in interesting ways, and for an array of characters to grow and develop. If the setting doesn’t serve your story, then you’re worldbuilding just for the joy of it, and while fun that certainly won’t strengthen your novel and short story. Secondly, you should know your world better than your reader. You always should avoid backstory and info dumps related to your setting. Don’t divulge all of the information you’ve gathered about your setting, just enough of it to keep the plot chugging along.

More articles about setting:
• How to choose a setting for your story
• Use caution when shifting story’s location, time
• Avoid placing ‘used furniture’ in your story
• Use care when naming places in your story
• Avoid anachronisms in stories set in past
• Use caution when employing empathic universe

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My name is Rob Bignell. I’m an affordable, professional editor who runs Inventing Reality Editing Service, which meets the manuscript needs of writers both new and published. I also offer a variety of self-publishing services. During the past decade, I’ve helped more than 300 novelists and nonfiction authors obtain their publishing dreams at reasonable prices. I’m also the author of the 7 Minutes a Day… writing guidebooks, four nonfiction hiking guidebook series, and the literary novel Windmill. Several of my short stories in the literary and science fiction genres also have been published.

Check out some of my writing guidebook about setting:

Create a Sense of Place in Your Novel, Short Story

In most great stories, the reader experiences an emotional reaction to the setting. Usually this emotion is a positive one as the reader wishes they really could go to such a place; of course, in novels such as a dystopia, the reader reviles the setting and may even be motivated to actively prevent our world from becoming such a horrible place.

When readers have an emotional response to the setting, the writer has succeeded in creating a sense of place. The setting feels real, whether it be entirely fictitious or if it already exists.

Consider the following passage set in a farmhouse where two bachelor farmers live:

The wind died as they entered the stuffy house, dark from the drawn curtains and yellowed Cape Cods over the kitchen sink. Boxes and stacks of newspapers lined the walls. Abbie noticed one pile topped by an edition dating back some 15 years. The furniture appeared at least that old as well, and for a moment Peter reproached himself for suggesting they go inside. Sitting at the dining table, he pushed away a cereal bowl of sour-smelling milk, while Lyle, his eyes caked with gray dust and belly sticking out even farther than usual, slumped in a chair across from him.

You probably had a visceral reaction to the farmhouse’s dirtiness. If so, that’s good – the author made the place so real that you responded to it.

You’ll also want to create a sense of place in your stories. When readers feel that the setting is real, they’re more likely to feel that they’re experiencing the story along with its characters. This in turn helps them to better understand and relate to the characters. In genre fiction when the setting is fantastical, a sense of place can make reading the story all that more fun.

You can make a setting feel real in two ways:
• Description – This involves showing what the setting looks, sounds, smells and even tastes and physically feels like. The farmhouse passage above is an example of using description to make a setting feel real.
• Worldbuilding – This is a well thought-out, expansive creation of a fictional world, such as its geography, cultures, ecology, history and more. It typically is done in science fiction and fantasy stories, but writers of any genre can create a world before writing. Historical fiction writers, for example, might map out a fictional village and the surrounding geography set in a real world, such as Tudor England.

One way to think of this is that description is the visible body of a setting and a necessity in every story. Worldbuilding is more the frame upon which description hangs, the bones of the body if you will, and sometimes is not particularly necessary for creating your story, especially when pieces are set in a contemporary location that is a backdrop setting.

More articles about setting:
• Which story setting to use? Backdrop vs. integral 
• Don’t copy favorite characters, settings 
• Describe setting from characters’ perspectives  
• Keep freeze-frame in story brief, relevant 
• Avoid reader confusion by anchoring story 
• Avoid using tropes in your story

______________

My name is Rob Bignell. I’m an affordable, professional editor who runs Inventing Reality Editing Service, which meets the manuscript needs of writers both new and published. I also offer a variety of self-publishing services. During the past decade, I’ve helped more than 300 novelists and nonfiction authors obtain their publishing dreams at reasonable prices. I’m also the author of the 7 Minutes a Day… writing guidebooks, four nonfiction hiking guidebook series, and the literary novel Windmill. Several of my short stories in the literary and science fiction genres also have been published.

Check out some of my writing guidebook about setting:

Podcast: Don’t underestimate first page’s importance

Professional Book Editor: Having your novel, short story or nonfiction manuscript proofread or edited before submitting it can prove invaluable. In an era where you face heavy competition, your writing needs a second eye to give you the edge. I can provide that second eye.

It’s easy to make up weird stuff. It gets trickier when you want the weird stuff to be interesting and make sense. – Brandon Mull

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How to use scene breaks in novels, short stories

Often in novels and long short stories, a scene break is needed. A scene break is a visual marker that lets readers know the setting has changed.

The scene break is important as it skips over the unimportant stuff in the story. For example, if our protagonist secret agent learns that another character in a different location has information he needs, there’s no need to show him driving to that site, stopping off for dinner along the way, or filling his sports car with gas afterward. Instead, just jump to the point in the story where he’s already arrived and is scoping out the locale to find a way to sneak in.

A scene break can be visually created by simply placing a blank line or three centered asterisks between the two scenes, as in:

“It was Gravin – Gravin was the one who smuggled the diamonds,” the scar-faced man gasped, as the cord around his neck tightened.

Ryan loosened his hold on the cord and gently set the scar-faced man’s head against the concrete floor. Then Ryan kicked the man’s head, pulled out his Glock G-43, and pressed his thumb against the trigger.

***

As Ryan’s head peeked above the shrubbery, his eyes scanned Gravin’s compound for an easy entry.

Dispensing with the here-to-there action ensures you keep the story’s level of suspense high. Readers are savvy enough to know that time has passed and could care less what the main character did during the interim.

A scene break can be used for other dramatic purposes than showing a change in setting, though. For example:

Jack wished they'd move on; he didn't know how much longer his sweaty hands could hold on to the cliff's edge. And then the dirt beneath his thumbs crumbled.

***

Sarah wrung her hands as gazing at the sunlit cliff above. Jack never was late.

In this case, the scene break occurs when the characters that the narration focuses on changes. (One scene is about Jack, and the other is about Sarah.) or when the point of view of view changes. (If Sara also was hanging over cliff with Jack and the narration switches from Jack's to Sara's perspective, then a scene break also is needed.)

The three centered asterisks aren’t the only way to show a scene break. Other symbols can be used; for example, a novel set at a marina might use a centered sailboat rather than asterisks. Or you may simply place a blank line between the two scenes; this can be problematic, however, if already using a blank space rather than indentations to mark the end and start of paragraphs, as is often done in ebooks.

Professional Book Editor: Having your novel, short story or nonfiction manuscript proofread or edited before submitting it can prove invaluable. In an economic climate where you face heavy competition, your writing needs a second eye to give you the edge. I can provide that second eye.

6 Tips on Bringing Settings to Life

• Which story setting to use? Backdrop vs. integral 
• Don’t copy favorite characters, settings 
• Describe setting from characters’ perspectives  
• Keep freeze-frame in story brief, relevant 
• Avoid reader confusion by anchoring story 
• Avoid using tropes in your story

Professional Book Editor: Having your novel, short story or nonfiction manuscript proofread or edited before submitting it can prove invaluable. In an economic climate where you face heavy competition, your writing needs a second eye to give you the edge. I can provide that second eye.

How to Choose Your Story's Setting

Professional Book Editor: Having your novel, short story or nonfiction manuscript proofread or edited before submitting it can prove invaluable. In an economic climate where you face heavy competition, your writing needs a second eye to give you the edge. I can provide that second eye.

 

How to establish setting in your story’s opening

Setting is the place and time in which the plot unfolds. The setting always must be established in a story’s opening lines.

A setting helps anchor the story. That’s because the conflicts the characters face hinge on where and when they are, which creates situations for the characters. After all, certain events and solutions simply cannot occur in various historical periods or locations. Further, if the setting is not given, readers almost always will think that the time of the story is contemporary – and if your story is not set in the early 21st century, then your reader will be disoriented when on page 2 you mention slaves in the Agora or talk about hopping a hyperdrive to Tau Ceti.

The setting need not be overtly stated. In fact, writers are best to infer the story’s place and time. Consider the following opening lines:

The valley below them stretched deep and black. On the ridge above was only scrub and rock with a stout, teetering stone wall at the edge. The sun rising behind the ridge had just begun to warm the wall and lift the shadows from the valley. The Californian and the girl with him sat on the wall where it remained upright, where rain and wind had yet to erode the granite at the ridge’s edge. In a half-hour, light would fully wash the dark from the valley, allowing the small river running through it to be seen.

“Want a cigarette?” the girl asked. She opened her macramé satchel that sat between them.

The Californian fished a lighter from his pocket. “Sure.”

From these opening lines, we know that the story’s setting is a ridge overlooking a river valley at sunrise or shortly after dawn. The description of the ridge being made of granite suggests this is a mountain ridge, as granite primarily appears in mountainous areas. The lack of details indicating that the weather is cold (seeing their breath, fumbling as getting the cigarettes and lighter with their gloves on) suggests that the season is summer, though maybe late spring or early autumn.

The reader doesn’t need to know the state or province where the ridge is located or even the name of the ridge or of the mountains. Exactly what day of the week it is or even the specific month is irrelevant. All that matters are the specific details of the place and time that directly affect the characters.

Given this, when describing the setting in your opening lines, follow these two rules:
• Tell how your main characters perceive this place – Specifically state what the characters can see, hear, smell, taste or touch to infer the place and time. Have readers experience the setting just as the characters would.
• Provide concrete details of the place – When offering what the characters experience in their setting, give specific, exact descriptions. In the above example, the valley is not vaguely described as “mysterious” but instead is dark, deep and covered by shadow.

Particularly in short stories, avoid long descriptions to establish the setting, as this can delay the introduction of the protagonist and the story’s central problem. If you must include lengthy descriptions, consider dividing your paragraph into three “sections”; for example, start with the foreground, then in the next couple of sentences go the middle, and at paragraph’s end to the background, or try left-center-right or sky-eye level-ground.

The location of your story should complement the plot and characters. When selecting where you will set your story, make it more than a backdrop for your tale.

You can accomplish this by ensuring your setting:
• Offers opportunities for your character to have conflicts – If a character is experiencing a man vs. nature or a man vs. himself conflict, then being marooned on an island is a great setting. That location probably won’t work for a man vs. society conflict, however. But think even deeper than that. Ask yourself where would the conflict and the narrative arc your main character goes through best be expressed? Suppose, for example, that your protagonist, now retired, decides to move back to the place of his childhood and renovate an old residence that nature is quickly reclaiming. A good setting for this would be a forested area that is really far out in the boondocks, the complete opposite of a large, cultured city where he has lived his entire adult life.
• Delivers a place where such conflicts naturally could occur – Don’t force a setting to fit the plot. Two ambitious corporate attorneys, for example, wouldn’t work in a small town but instead in a big city downtown high rise. Their environs are the restaurants, offices and penthouses of their corporate clients. If the attorneys live and work in a small town, this would undercut the story’s believability.
• Provides plenty of space for lots of action to occur – If your main character needs to grapple with kidnappers inside a building, make it a large skyscraper or a massive warehouse where there’s space for the action unfold. A seaside village doesn’t allow a lot of space for a sophisticated spy to battle a criminal organization throughout a novel, though it would work fine in a chapter or scene.
• Feels like a real place to readers – A setting obviously can be made-up but ought to feel like it actually could exist. That means appealing to the reader’s five senses in your description and then including parallels to something similar readers are familiar with (which is why so many science fiction novels structure spacecraft operations of the future like those of today’s naval vessels). If using a real place, always do your research so that you don’t include factual errors and so that you can provide evocative details to capture the location’s feel.
• Improves the story’s quality via the feeling or tone of the setting – The seedy side of a city at night is perfect for a dark, gritty story. A swamp works well for a horror story. That’s because the emotions the setting evokes matches the story’s tone. If you’re successful at this, you probably will create an interesting and memorable setting.

Professional Book Editor: Having your novel, short story or nonfiction manuscript proofread or edited before submitting it can prove invaluable. In an economic climate where you face heavy competition, your writing needs a second eye to give you the edge. I can provide that second eye.

How to Write a Bestselling Novel: In 7 Minutes a Day to Your Bestseller, writers receive expert advice on topics like motivating yourself to write, starting your story with exciting opening lines, creating intriguing characters, mastering the craft of writing to elevate your style, and pitching your story to potential publishers.