Start with a mapSo, you want to build a world in which to tell a story. Well, as someone who has created a whole amazing world(in my humble opinion), let me show you how I got started. When I first started creating The Middle Lands, I began with a basic map. We begin with a basic shape (as you can see the general shape above^). From there you can create various features in the land. I would highly recommend keeping a key so your land formation markings are consistent, As you can see in the image above, I added mountains, rivers, and volcano's to this map. From there you can create names for the various regions in your world. In the case of The Middle Lands, you can see that all boundaries are physical, such as mountains and rivers. Now of course this doesn't have to be the case, you can have more political boundaries in your worlds instead.
When it comes to naming things, when I created the original map of The Middle Lands, I was a little less skilled and named things ridiculously like Kenada and The Ethan Lands, I pray that you do NOT do this! When I had to rename some of the places in The Middle Lands, I looked into the Latin and Greek roots for words associated with major features of each land. For example, Infernterra comes from two root words, Inferno, which means fire, and Terra, which means earth, which means Infernterra literally means "Fiery Earth", an apt description of that particular area. From there we named the major formations, such as the Valley River and The River Unknown. Now would be the best time for you to figure out where your major settlements or plot-relevant places are, and mark them. As you can see on this map, the River, Jungle, and Sea Temples are all marked as they are important places in this world. And there you have it, finish up the map with any more details you would like to fill in and you have a general map of a world for you to tell fantastical stories in. I hope this was useful and I plan on continuing to write more articles on world building 101. If you have any interest in exploring this world any further, please visit HERE to get The Castaway Hero on Amazon or HERE to get it through Barnes and Noble. Until next time, keep on writing!
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Welcome to The Writers Block!AuthorKen Mears is a new 17 year old author, here to share his wisdom, advice, and experiences with you, the reader! Archives
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