Post #215 May 25 2020
“Building Imaginary Worlds”
Every writer of fiction builds imaginary worlds in
his story. For science fiction and
fantasy writers, this is especially important, since the worlds they create are
often unlike any experienced by humans before…that’s the whole point. In this blog, I want to detail some important
aspects of this creative job and use one of my own story series to illustrate.
Here are three aspects of imaginary world-building
that writers should consider as they are developing their masterpiece:
- Physical setting. Sometimes, especially in sf, the actual physical setting is the story. Think of Lord of the Rings. Think of Arthur C. Clarke’s Rendezvous with Rama or Larry Niven’s Ringworld stories. The writer must ask himself where the story takes place. Is the setting Earth as we know it? Is it off-Earth, like another planet or another dimension? Is it Hogwarts? The writer must then consider how to portray simple physical details of this place…what is the temperature like, air pressure, etc. Does the story take place on land, on or under the water? How about gravity?
Several years ago, I
wrote the first novel in my series The Farpool Stories. This story (The Farpool) largely took
place on an oceanic world called Seome.
I said this about that world:
Seome is a planet somewhat smaller
than Earth, 98% covered in water. There
are approximately 30 islands that comprise the total land mass of the
planet. Most of them are only a few
kilometers wide but about ten exceed 50 square kilometers in size. Most of the islands are clustered near the
equator, or branch out in chains or arcs from the cluster, often following the
submerged ocean ridges that trisect the waters.
Seome is one of four planets, two large gas
giants and two smaller terrestrial rock-core worlds, orbiting the star-sun
Sigma Albeth B. The other planets are
uninhabited.
Neither small planet has any natural satellite but both
gas giants have literally scores of satellites in orbit about them.
Seome is about 11,500 kilometers in diameter and its
gravity is slightly less than Earth’s.
Of particular note is the planet’s perpetual cloud cover, permanent
except for one location: the summit peak of the island of Ordeld in the
northeastern sea, at certain times of the year.
Seome has two seasons: high storm and low storm, roughly
corresponding to periods of greater and lesser storm activity. The planet rotates nearly twice as fast as
Earth, so the “day” is only half as long.
However, the low light level doesn’t really reflect the speed of
rotation. It is uniformly low.
The planet has a magnetic field and an iron core. Earthquakes are common, often creating
tsunamis that dwarf anything seen on Earth.
The period of solar revolution is about 18 Earth months, 50% longer.
In other words, one Earth year is 2/3 per Seome year. A Seome year is called a mah and it
corresponds to one complete north-south-north migration cycle of the planktonic
mah’jeet organisms.
- Time Period. Will your imaginary world exist today, or what I call the timeless present? Is it set in the past? Or the future? Is time travel involved? The Farpool actually involves all of these characteristics. If the story is set in the past, you have to decide how closely you will follow actual history. How accurately will you detail this past? What will you change? Many years ago, I wrote a story called Final Victory. It’s an alternate history novel, set in WWII.
Here’s what I wrote in
the book description:
In August 1945, the U.S. used two atomic bombs against
Japan. But a third bomb was also built. What if a special ops team from Japan
and the Soviet Union had managed to steal the third bomb? Japanese leaders
wanted to end the war, but not on America’s terms. To get better terms, a plan
is developed to seize the third bomb and threaten San Francisco with it. The
story of the Imperial Japanese plan for Final Victory ranges from Tokyo to
Tinian Island, Moscow to Alaska, from Los Alamos to a stolen B-29 winging its
way toward the City by the Bay. Only Army counter-intelligence agent Colonel
Wade Brogan can stop the plan.
Other than changing history enough to accommodate my
premise, as stated above, I tried to be scrupulously accurate and faithful to
the historical record. In some ways,
this is more challenging than creating a world from scratch. I have great respect for sf authors like
Harry Turtledove who do this so well.
- The People. Will your characters be humans or human-like? If not, how different will they be? In The Farpool, most of my characters are intelligent marine people, i.e. talking fish. I had to develop a whole new biology, history, culture and politics for this society and how it would react when real humans were encountered. I even developed the rudiments of a language suitable for ocean-dwelling characters who mainly used sound, smell and taste to find their way around…a truly alien people compared to humans.
I wrote this about the
physiology of the Seomish people:
Although the
Seomish resemble dolphins and porpoises externally, they are not mammals. They are fish, true marine creatures. They average about 3 meters in length and
possess two forearms that have evolved from pectoral fins into prehensile limbs
approximately ½ to ¾ meter in length, with five fingers and one opposing thumb
at the end of each arm.
The Seomish breathe through gills,
extracting oxygen from the water that is strained through gill slits on either
side of the head, which is really only an extension of the main body
trunk. The body is streamlined for speed
(up to 20 km/hr for healthy males at maturity) which is generated by lateral
undulations of the caudal, or tail fin.
The peduncle is the muscle that moves this fin.
The Seomish have two dorsal fins, one over
the midsection and one just forward of the peduncle. Along with a pair of anal fins (beneath the
second dorsal), a small pair of vestigial pectoral fins attached to the
forearms (above the wrist) provides anti-roll stability. The arms and the tail give maneuvering and
braking power and the arms are tucked against the sides of speed.
The Seomish have evolved an internal gas
bladder, dorsally located, to help them maintain buoyancy. The presence of this organ limits the depth
and vertical range of their natural movement but technological developments can
overcome these obstacles.
The Seomish have relatively poor eyesight,
good vision not being essential in the often dark, murky waters of Seome. They have no tear ducts or eyelids.
The Seomish senses of smell and hearing are
keen, however. A great deal of the
standard Seomish language is concerned with scent information and is
unconveyable by sight or sound. There is
an olfactory vocabulary of chemical odors that are often captured and stored in
scentbulbs, called ot’lum, in the spoken vernacular.
The Seomish can
smell the difference not only in body odors but in various kinds of water,
according to its salt, dirt, or nutrient content. They have words for all these. Because olfactory impressions tend to
disperse slowly, the Seomish do not separate the past from the present as
readily as humans. Instead, they view
the past as living in the present, as a shadow or ghost or alternate spirit of
the present.
The Seomish
sense of hearing is acute and far-ranging.
Just below the mouth, at the rear of the throat and forward of the gill
cavity, is a small bag-like organ, called a soundsac, or shkelt. It is an echo-location system that emits
low-frequency waves that can carry for upwards of thirty to fifty kilometers,
depending on the location of the deep-level sound channel (the ootkeeor, or
“discovering water”). Much of the
Seomish language consists of grunts, whistles and clicks, all sounds that
travel well in water.
The Seomish also
possess a pressure-sensitive lateral line organ. The organ functions as a true sixth sense and
is sensitive to low-frequency vibrations.
It is used for short-range guidance, collision avoidance and for
determining the present state of the ambient water as well as local currents.
Seomish are
heterosexual and reproduce by copulation, the female bearing live young after a
gestation period of about one and a half mah.
Seomish males
usually live to an average age of 150 mah (see Seomish time-keeping) and
females somewhat longer, 160 mah.
The Seomish have
silvery-gray skin, smooth, non-scaly at maturity. They are born pinkish-white and aging
gradually darkens the skin.
Average weight
for a mature Seomish male is 230 kilograms.
Females weigh somewhat less.
Perhaps
more detail than needed but it helped me to stay consistent and believable
throughout The Farpool Stories.
In fact, I developed enough detail on the world of Seome and its
denizens that I collected it into an appendix and included it at the end of
most of the novels in this series.
Frank Herbert, author of Dune, did one of the most detailed
appendices I’ve ever seen in an sf novel.
When
building your imaginary world, pay attention to these aspects. Develop as much detail as you need to be
believable and consistent in the story.
You’ll find this preliminary work can be hugely rewarding in
itself. Even better, doing the hard
work of building an imaginary world can often suggest even more story
possibilities than you originally thought up.
As a matter of fact, I’m planning on returning to The Farpool Stories
and the world of Seome in the near future, for at least three more novels.
In
observance of Memorial Day, The Word Shed will take a one-week
hiatus. The next post to The Word
Shed comes on June 8, 2020. Have a
great holiday.
See
you then.
Phil
B.
