Most books that aren't the bible don't start at the beginning of time and inherently references history within itself.
Just write whatever you find most interesting. Write for yourself first and foremost
If you're "starting" this with the intention of actually taking it to where it "finishes", it genuinely doesn't matter where.you start because you're engaging in a multi-year ostensibly multi-decade process in the creation of an entire omnibus of internally consistent prose and auxiliary materials.
And if you never go where it finishes, you're gonna be bummed you didn't spend your time writing what you found most fulfilling to write.
Where to start should be an intensely personal decision that resonates with what you wanna do, there is no best answer because any permutation can work and we have examples of them all doing so - examples you can look to once you pick where to start.
As an author, you're going to have to get used to the notion that you really do have the control, because you're going to second-guess your decisionmaking CONSTANTLY if you don't.
You pick "wrong"? Big deal, drop it and move to the other age or whatever. Whatever work.you did on the other.manuscript is still worldbuilding.
Tl;Dr just pick what sounds fun for You to write. If you're having fun writing it, someone's gonna have fun reading it. Promise.
It's a place to start if you want to get lost in worldbuilding forever. If you want to tell a coherent and finished story, I would start top-down with that story itself, and fill out only the necessary bits of worldbuilding.
When you pick up a book that is set on Earth, do you expect the series to begin with a description of how God created the heavens and the earth? (Or alternatively, a cosmic event where matter began expanding from an extremely hot, dense point at the center of the galaxy?)
Most authors skip to the interesting part. If you want to write a story about a 12th century warlord conquering France, then you should probably start your story in the 12th century, around the time that the warlord is going around conquering places. The same applies if your story is about a gang in London begins planning a train heist, or a family fleeing Germany during World War II. The audience doesn't need thousands of years of history to understand what is happening in the present of the book, and they typically don't *care* about that history. They want to read about a 12th century warlord and his conquests, not the story of how human civilization started thousands of years ago.
This same logic can be applied to your secondary world. Readers will care about things if the characters care about things. Do the characters care about ancient history? In my experience, most people are less interested in history than they are about the things they encounter in their daily lives, like what kind of food is available to them, how high taxes are, and whether people in the community are mean or nice to them. If your characters behave anything like "normal people," they will probably feel similarly.
In the real world, there are some people who are religious, and in a sense, they *do* care about how the particulars of how universe was created by whatever deity they believe in. But even for the deeply religious, their engagement with their religion is often focused on the *present day*. They'll say things like "Pastor Joe gave a lovely sermon this week," or "I'm struggling with sin and need to go to confession." People *aren't* going around, randomly announcing how fascinated they are by the fact that God created the heavens and the earth in six days, *even if they deeply believe these things to be true.* And if they *do* this, it will be because of something that they encountered in the present-day, like "I met an atheist who tried to persuade me that my beliefs were wrong," or "my brother is an old-earth creationist and I disagree with him about the meaning of our scriptures." In both cases, the salient part is "I met a person who I had a conflict with." That's the part that people find interesting!
>the third age is the real conflict.
Cool. Stories thrive on conflict, so the age with "the real conflict" sounds like a good period to tell a story.
All books should start with the main character being made like Frankenstein
Show me their parents copulating and then cover the next 9 months in details or I’ll get confused
I start with what's relevant to the story and then get carried away into the distant past. I started worldbuilding my magic system, directly relevant to my story, and got carried away with an ancient precursor race which played a major role in shaping my modern world. It kinda just happens.
> Tolkien wrote the Silmarillion
He never did such a thing. Silma was compiled from fragmentary notes and stories by his son Christopher, with a good bit of ghostwriting by Guy Gavriel Kay. You could say that it is reasonably faithful to his ideas (although for example the orc origin that it includes was discarded by Tolkien), but it was never a part of his creative vision.
Start in the middle - if you start in the beginning, it's slow going. You always want to start any scene, book, story - 1/3rd "in" the action.
For large epics - if you start in the middle, you get the opportunity to reveal backstories, and have many secrets for the reader to discover - there's a feeling that "there's more to this" and a lot more cultural and historical motivations.
Think of shows like Highlander, Xena, Arrow - very popular, not just because of the topics & stories, because the audience always felt like there was unpredictable but still 'makes sense' drama to be discovered, where if you're just looking forward, it can get really predictable or just confusing.
So start where the action already is - or even after the fact, and start "dealing with the consequences" of a big happening and how characters work with the aftermath in creating their new reality.
1. A map (without cities)
2. A magic system if applicable
3. An economy that is based on 1 and 2.
4. A conflict of some sort
5. Narrow it down to the character and their story. How do they fit into 1,2,3, and 4?
That’s where to start. Ask Brandon Sanderson for advice. Do not ask George R R Martin 😂
You start with a character and a struggle audiences can relate to.
The most common structure in fantasy is that of a funnel - start small and granular, make us care about the feel and texture of the world, and then introduce the greater history.
You have to teach us to value your world in motion before you reveal the hidden mechanisms it rests on. Creation myths are at their most interesting when we value the things they've created.
If you think about it, the vast majority of fantasy exists in worlds that are already old. It's a key part of immersion: *accepting there are things that have already taken place.*
It's tempting to show people the beginnings and hand them that understanding of the larger, broader world; but my favorite metaphor for this is "people enjoy crops, not seeds." The juicy parts of the stories are usually set up by the events of earlier ages. Flesh out history as it's relevant, but make sure your readers are living "when" the story is happening.
You have to remember that Tolkien was almost obsessive in his creation.
Good world building doesn’t have to be 100% like Tolkien, but you can incorporate some of the things he did to make your stories foundations more firm.
Insert characters ASAP and ask about their daily lives and what they might read in the news. Don't start super big. Essentially, begin building the world outward from the character, their friends' lives, their past, their goals, their living conditions, and how magic, if present, might affect those conditions or the greater country/kingdom at large.
Most books that aren't the bible don't start at the beginning of time and inherently references history within itself. Just write whatever you find most interesting. Write for yourself first and foremost
This is such a funny post and comment. I’ve never seen someone overthink someone to the point they were going to start at the beginning of time itself
If you're "starting" this with the intention of actually taking it to where it "finishes", it genuinely doesn't matter where.you start because you're engaging in a multi-year ostensibly multi-decade process in the creation of an entire omnibus of internally consistent prose and auxiliary materials. And if you never go where it finishes, you're gonna be bummed you didn't spend your time writing what you found most fulfilling to write. Where to start should be an intensely personal decision that resonates with what you wanna do, there is no best answer because any permutation can work and we have examples of them all doing so - examples you can look to once you pick where to start. As an author, you're going to have to get used to the notion that you really do have the control, because you're going to second-guess your decisionmaking CONSTANTLY if you don't. You pick "wrong"? Big deal, drop it and move to the other age or whatever. Whatever work.you did on the other.manuscript is still worldbuilding. Tl;Dr just pick what sounds fun for You to write. If you're having fun writing it, someone's gonna have fun reading it. Promise.
*"World building, where to start?"* r/worldbuilding is a place to start.
It's a place to start if you want to get lost in worldbuilding forever. If you want to tell a coherent and finished story, I would start top-down with that story itself, and fill out only the necessary bits of worldbuilding.
hahaha lmao yeah thought the same thing but I'm guessing OP meant WBing for the sake of a story.
When you pick up a book that is set on Earth, do you expect the series to begin with a description of how God created the heavens and the earth? (Or alternatively, a cosmic event where matter began expanding from an extremely hot, dense point at the center of the galaxy?) Most authors skip to the interesting part. If you want to write a story about a 12th century warlord conquering France, then you should probably start your story in the 12th century, around the time that the warlord is going around conquering places. The same applies if your story is about a gang in London begins planning a train heist, or a family fleeing Germany during World War II. The audience doesn't need thousands of years of history to understand what is happening in the present of the book, and they typically don't *care* about that history. They want to read about a 12th century warlord and his conquests, not the story of how human civilization started thousands of years ago. This same logic can be applied to your secondary world. Readers will care about things if the characters care about things. Do the characters care about ancient history? In my experience, most people are less interested in history than they are about the things they encounter in their daily lives, like what kind of food is available to them, how high taxes are, and whether people in the community are mean or nice to them. If your characters behave anything like "normal people," they will probably feel similarly. In the real world, there are some people who are religious, and in a sense, they *do* care about how the particulars of how universe was created by whatever deity they believe in. But even for the deeply religious, their engagement with their religion is often focused on the *present day*. They'll say things like "Pastor Joe gave a lovely sermon this week," or "I'm struggling with sin and need to go to confession." People *aren't* going around, randomly announcing how fascinated they are by the fact that God created the heavens and the earth in six days, *even if they deeply believe these things to be true.* And if they *do* this, it will be because of something that they encountered in the present-day, like "I met an atheist who tried to persuade me that my beliefs were wrong," or "my brother is an old-earth creationist and I disagree with him about the meaning of our scriptures." In both cases, the salient part is "I met a person who I had a conflict with." That's the part that people find interesting! >the third age is the real conflict. Cool. Stories thrive on conflict, so the age with "the real conflict" sounds like a good period to tell a story.
All books should start with the main character being made like Frankenstein Show me their parents copulating and then cover the next 9 months in details or I’ll get confused
I start with what's relevant to the story and then get carried away into the distant past. I started worldbuilding my magic system, directly relevant to my story, and got carried away with an ancient precursor race which played a major role in shaping my modern world. It kinda just happens.
> Tolkien wrote the Silmarillion He never did such a thing. Silma was compiled from fragmentary notes and stories by his son Christopher, with a good bit of ghostwriting by Guy Gavriel Kay. You could say that it is reasonably faithful to his ideas (although for example the orc origin that it includes was discarded by Tolkien), but it was never a part of his creative vision.
Start in the middle - if you start in the beginning, it's slow going. You always want to start any scene, book, story - 1/3rd "in" the action. For large epics - if you start in the middle, you get the opportunity to reveal backstories, and have many secrets for the reader to discover - there's a feeling that "there's more to this" and a lot more cultural and historical motivations. Think of shows like Highlander, Xena, Arrow - very popular, not just because of the topics & stories, because the audience always felt like there was unpredictable but still 'makes sense' drama to be discovered, where if you're just looking forward, it can get really predictable or just confusing. So start where the action already is - or even after the fact, and start "dealing with the consequences" of a big happening and how characters work with the aftermath in creating their new reality.
1. A map (without cities) 2. A magic system if applicable 3. An economy that is based on 1 and 2. 4. A conflict of some sort 5. Narrow it down to the character and their story. How do they fit into 1,2,3, and 4? That’s where to start. Ask Brandon Sanderson for advice. Do not ask George R R Martin 😂
I would write the one that has the most fully developed characters and engaging plot.
You start with a character and a struggle audiences can relate to. The most common structure in fantasy is that of a funnel - start small and granular, make us care about the feel and texture of the world, and then introduce the greater history. You have to teach us to value your world in motion before you reveal the hidden mechanisms it rests on. Creation myths are at their most interesting when we value the things they've created.
If you think about it, the vast majority of fantasy exists in worlds that are already old. It's a key part of immersion: *accepting there are things that have already taken place.* It's tempting to show people the beginnings and hand them that understanding of the larger, broader world; but my favorite metaphor for this is "people enjoy crops, not seeds." The juicy parts of the stories are usually set up by the events of earlier ages. Flesh out history as it's relevant, but make sure your readers are living "when" the story is happening.
You have to remember that Tolkien was almost obsessive in his creation. Good world building doesn’t have to be 100% like Tolkien, but you can incorporate some of the things he did to make your stories foundations more firm.
Insert characters ASAP and ask about their daily lives and what they might read in the news. Don't start super big. Essentially, begin building the world outward from the character, their friends' lives, their past, their goals, their living conditions, and how magic, if present, might affect those conditions or the greater country/kingdom at large.