Learn How To Write Fantasy

Aspiring writers desiring to learn how to write a fantasy novel must develop not only fantasy characters, but also the fantasy world in which the story takes place. Fantasy world building includes elements of magic, geography, climate, history, religion and social structure. With these fundamentals in place, fantasy characters move about kingdoms, lands and realms where the fantastic awaits at every turn.

Writing a fantasy novel leads authors to unique dimensions of the imagination. Fantasy beings gifted in the craft of magic or who possess supernatural powers present avenues for plot twists as unique as the fantasy author's imagination. Articles listed here will help writers learn how to create fantasy characters and scenarios within mythical magical realms.

 

Fantasy World Building

To learn the art of world building, fantasy writers must take into consideration that magic stretches parameters of possibilities beyond the norm. Natural elements like climate, geography and history set the scene but may fall under magical influence. For example: A fantasy world's history can change if a character travels back in time (magic) and changes a single event (A Wrinkle in Time, and The Time Machine).

Geographical landscapes may be subject to alteration if a spell or enchantment causes a change like a shift in the sun's intensity. If the sun's strength increases or decreases, landscapes may shrivel from lush and verdant to barren or ice-encrusted. Consider The Lion the Witch and the Wardrobe where the white witch ensures that it is always winter. Collecting appropriate information to make your world changing events believable will require research.

Fantasy world building involves real world fundamentals such as government, politics and legal systems to enforce the law. When considering the part history plays in the development of a fantasy world, things like wars, commerce and trade, science and technology all hold significance. Even rudimentary aspects of daily life involving manners and customs, education and specific apparel may play an intricate part in the story line. Create enough past and future to make sense for the story's timeline.

 

Fantasy Characters

World building sets the stage for believable characters to live within the charmed borders of the fantasy world. Authors supply characters with a working knowledge of how the magic works. For example: Flora and fauna may transform characters with unexplained capabilities such as casting a change in personality spell, causing forgetfulness, or cursing anyone pricked by a thorn with 100 years sleep, while inanimate objects like rocks can take on life to become an indestructible foe. Flower people, rock monsters and other entertaining characters come to life when the magic works, and fantasy characters with more human-like characteristics accept these other life forms as a genuine part of reality.

For instance in Tolkien's The Fellowship of the Ring, Gandalf visits Frodo and passes on the history of the ring. Readers accept not only hobbits, the powers of the ring, and the rising of the Dark Power in the Land of Mordor, but when Frodo and his friends have barely left the Shire, their encounter with the Black Riders, although mysterious, is believable. A working knowledge of mythical magic unique to the world aids readers in understanding characters, supplies a knowledge of what's at stake and a comprehension of what resources are available as characters enter epic battles of good versus evil with a full understanding of what to expect.

 

Magic - How it Works

Threads of the supernatural and fantastic run through fantasy novels no matter the subgenre. Modern day fantasy conjectures worlds different and separate from the world in which we live. When writing a fantasy novel, it helps to map geographical terrain of the fictional world and track supernatural elements and powers, including magical amulets and other charms along with how they work or don't work.

For example: Items such as swords (The Sword and the Stone), shoes (The Wonderful Wizard of Oz), wands (Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone), spells, enchantments, etc. all operate under a set of rules, because even in magical realms laws of magic apply. Mapping and tracking help fantasy writers produce a logical foundation for where characters live and how mythical magic works within the story. When this is done correctly, readers learn to accept supernatural elements as natural because they make sense.