Creating science fiction fantasy worlds - has every story been written?

 

If every story has been written before, isn’t it the same for the worlds we create in our books? If life is universal, does it develop everywhere in the same pattern? Of course, not. There is also the possibility of worlds and beings so outrageous that they are impossible for us to conceive or imagine. They could even be invisible to us. But then, would they be relatable to the reader?

When we consider Star Trek’s original thinking, it’s about exploration, and the main characters are still human and relatable… like the Vulcans, the Klingons, or the Romulans… even the Borg. Their motivations, although different from ours, are still within our comprehension.

Then, there are entities of pure evil, destructive, without empathy... but although they affect the lives of the crew, they are impossible for us to fathom.

Star Wars main characters are from different worlds, but mostly human as well with human flaws, like the diverse patrons of some outpost bars with weird Jazz music and alien fringe clientele. Even the robots display human feelings.

When Frank Herbert wrote DUNE, he lived in Egypt and took his inspiration from the Tuaregs, a desert tribe of the Sahara. There are so many diverse cultures in this world, that one needn’t go very far to find interesting societies with different sets of rules… especially if you consider the past.

Check out this award-winning universe of mine, Chronicles of Kassouk
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Cultures like the Greeks, the Romans, the ancient Egyptians, the Vikings, the Mongols, the Samurai, the mid-eastern tales of a thousand and one nights, the ancient Silk Road, all can inspire us to create new worlds, slightly similar yet different.

In CHI WARRIOR, Book One of the PROTECTORS trilogy, scheduled for release this November, I created a medieval post-apocalyptic world, where simple communities survived far apart, separated by wide deserts, high mountains, vast steppes, and uncrossable rivers with dangerous rapids.

As for the culture, it would be basic, simple, but lawless, and the strongest leaders would fight for supremacy, oppressing the weak to gain power in the name of peace.

On such a planet, imagine an oasis of harmony, a self-sufficient monastery in the middle of the desert, devoted to the study of martial arts, with fearsome fighters… and some ancient technology left behind by Immortals who came from the stars.

When the fictional world you created is a character in the story, it also must have a past, and this one is no exception. I will not tell you what it is, because it’s an important twist in the book.

CHI WARRIOR is scheduled for release November 2025. Here is the most recent blurb, still subject to change.

Anila, spiritual warrior woman, trained all her life in the desert, at the monastery of the Celestial Gate, to take the vows of the mighty Protectors. That’s all she’s ever known, all she ever wanted. But a black cloud with wings haunts her nightmares.

When a barbarian horde descends from the north, Bayor Khan seems unstoppable, determined to destroy everything in his path. Rumors of his cruelty make the most powerful princes tremble in their stone fortresses.

Anila is pulled into the inevitable clash as a prophecy unfolds, blurring the lines between good and evil. But nothing is as it seems… not even her, or Bayor Khan. An ancient enemy rises in the shadows, and the falling darkness threatens Anila and everyone she loves.

In the meantime, check out my latest award-winning epic sci-fi fantasy series, available everywhere online: 

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Happy Reading

Vijaya Schartz, award-winning author

Strong Heroines, Brave Heroes, Epic Adventure

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Building a Galaxy by Daniel Dickinson

 

PART 2: Gaiman’s Galaxies

“If you like fantasy and you want to be the next Tolkien, don’t read big Tolkienesque fantasies—Tolkien didn’t read big Tolkienesque fantasies, he read books on Finnish philology. Go and read outside of your comfort zone, go and learn stuff.” – Neil Gaiman

In contrast to Tolkien’s lush but laser-focused realm of Middle Earth stand the vast worlds and dimensions of Neil Gaiman. A “feral child who was raised in libraries,” as he calls himself, the award-winning author of Stardust, American Gods, and Coraline among others, uses broad paint strokes to create a larger-than-life world where mythology and denizens of alternate dimensions play a key part in expanding the borders of reality. Deep, dark, and dreary, Gaiman’s strange domains are equally as vibrant as Tolkien’s. Where the two authors differ substantially is in their approach to world-building.

Where Tolkien’s Middle Earth emerges of necessity as his characters move through their journey, Gaiman’s alternate realities play an integral part in his stories. For example, American Gods uses gods, themselves, as characters— diving deep into their milieu to drive the narrative. Thus, although the story takes place in a recognizable U.S., the Old and New Gods’ otherworldly mythology is very present.

Here is an example from Chapter 6 of American Gods to illustrate: “When the people came to America they brought us with them. They brought me, and Loki and Thor, Anansi and the Lion-God, Leprechauns and Kobolds and Banshees, Kubera and Frau Holle and Ashtaroth, and they brought you. We rode here in their minds, and we took root. We traveled with the settlers to the new lands across the ocean. The land is vast. Soon enough, our people abandoned us, remembered us only as creatures of the old land, as things that had not come with them to the new. Our true believers passed on, or stopped believing, and we were left, lost and scared and dispossessed, only what little smidgens of worship or belief we could find. And to get by as best we could."

Giving these unearthly characters the freedom to roam both current and past timelines of a familiar quasi-reality instantly expands the scope in which he’s writing. Gaiman’s skill is such that he accomplishes this feat without its ever feeling heavy handed or out of place. As he explains, “When you start writing you’re in a profession which involves making stuff up and inventing stuff. You’re making up people, you’re making up places; you’re talking about things that manifestly aren’t true.“

As in American Gods, the title character of Coraline dives into an alternate dimension of her world. Dark and twisted, it has its own set of rules that govern reality as she moves through it. In one world she finds herself ignored and alone; in the other she is the concentrated focus of attention and is given everything she ever wanted. Gaiman economically presents the “through-the-looking-glass” dimension in this excerpt from Chapter 10:

"Stay here with us," said the voice from the figure at the end of the room. "We will listen to you and play with you and laugh with you. Your other mother will build whole worlds for you to explore, and tear them down every night when you are done. Every day will be better and brighter than the one that went before. Remember the toybox? How much better would a world be built just like that, and all for you?"

Gaiman plays a multiverse of realities to great effect in most of his books. Typically, several realities simultaneously exist within his novels. Even if only briefly hinted at, like those in American Gods, these multiple existences expand time and space and give the reader a sense of grand scale. “Everybody has a secret world inside of them,” he says. “I mean everybody. All of the people in the whole world—I mean everybody—no matter how dull and boring they are on the outside. Inside them they've all got unimaginable, magnificent, wonderful, stupid, amazing worlds... Not just one world. Hundreds of them. Thousands, maybe.” 

Like Coraline, some of Gaiman’s stories focus solely on one or two dimensions; however, the presence of a greater cosmos outside the characters purview is there, ever-present in the shadows of the story. His novel, Stardust, unfolds in a multiverse: The star that fell had to come from somewhere. As readers, we have previous knowledge regarding time and space of real-world, earthly England situated in the Milky Way; in another dimension, we also have Stormhold and its galaxy. By using his readers’ prior knowledge and understanding of how the world works, and their preconceived notions of time and space, Gaiman has freed himself from the necessity of writing minutely detailed descriptions—as Tolkien was obliged to write of Middle Earth. 

While the multiverse of his stories is expansive, he tethers an alternate reality to a character’s story arc in a way that makes it relatable to a reader. Gaiman uses the established notion of mythology as a springboard for the metaphors distinguishing many of his stories. Threads of this can be seen around the religious aspects of Gaimen’s world-building: He uses various spiritual beliefs and deities to bring together a greater diversity of thoughts and imaginations.

“Religions are, by definition, metaphors, after all,” he says. “God is a dream, a hope, a woman, an ironist, a father, a city, a house of many rooms, a watchmaker who left his prize chronometer in the desert, someone who loves you—even, perhaps against all evidence, a celestial being whose only interest is to make sure your football team, army, business, or marriage thrives, prospers, and triumphs over all opposition.” 

Gaiman’s approach can seem daunting if you’re just beginning. However, as I previously mentioned, it has one major advantage: You don’t need to build what you already have. Almost everyone knows what a stop sign is, understands a gas station, or can imagine a certain American or British town or city. Thus, by utilizing a story set in a world that you, as an author, already inhabit, you put much of the world-building into the hands of your reader.

You may run into issues when the world you’re building becomes fantastical, or rockets through space at near lightspeed, and you suddenly find yourself responsible for an entire cosmos of information, history, conflict, and environments. But that’s where the real fun begin

Beginning at the age of ten, Arizona native Daniel Dickinson has spent a lifetime inventing realistic realms for his fictional characters. His fantasy world, Xonthian— created during his teen years—is an entire domain that allows his characters’ journeys to unfold in a diverse setting. He enjoys giving educational presentations about world-building and fantasy genres, in general. Daniel’s published works include the short story, Escape from Ogre Island; a two-story horror book, Don’t Close Your Eyes: Two Thrilling Tales of Terror; Aggression Factor; and Gathering Tide. More about Daniel at https://www.tigerforce.net/ and https://shoutoutarizona.com/meet-daniel-dickinson-author/