Author of Hunted, The Relics of War, The Caein Legacy, & The Mage War Chronicles
The Worldbuilder Diaries: Magic Systems If you’re expecting detailed schematics or a breakdown of minutiae for every element of a magic system in this post, I’m sorry to say you’ll be disappointed. My current magic systems aren’t that involved… For me, to delve too deeply into how magic works shifts it away from the realm […]
The Worldbuilder Diaries: Food and Drink As someone who enjoys cooking/baking in real life, I have added some mentions of food into my books, and they’re not always the typical variety, either. I have several species featured that don’t have the typical human-style omnivore diet, and their food preferences also come up in my stories. […]
The Worldbuilder Diaries: Technology This is a post I’ve been excited to write, but also one that I wasn’t sure how to begin. So let’s start with what I mean by “technology.” The standard definitions of the word are as follows: Looking at all of the above, technology can encompass anything from a hatchet to […]
The Worldbuilder Diaries: Deities and Religions By this point in my writing life, I’ve concocted a decent array of gods and goddesses for some of my worlds, while others are conspicuously devoid of any deity at all. I have just as much fun developing worlds that have a bit of religion as I do those […]
The Worldbuilder Diaries: Non-Human Peoples I have a pretty descent array of non-humans featured in my books, though not nearly as many as some authors. I tend to create my non-humans (mostly) from my imagination; I rarely use the typical fantasy races like elves or dwarves (and in the instances I have, those books aren’t […]
The Worldbuilder Diaries: Creatures Now that I’ve covered all of what I consider the “basic” elements of worldbuilding—the building blocks like maps, characters, and organization—I can finally move on to some of the more interesting topics. But this series had to start somewhere, right? Creatures vs. Characters First off, I’d like to discuss what I […]
The Worldbuilder Diaries: Naming Conventions This is sort of a continuation of my last post of this series, Organization of Characters. Most characters have names, and oftentimes, those names will follow some sort of rule. Now, what those rules are can be entirely up to the author, especially with sci-fi or fantasy. They can based […]
The Worldbuilder Diaries: Organization of Characters Keeping track of your characters can be a daunting task, especially when working on a larger series. I can’t claim to have the best tips or answers to all of your burning organizational questions, but I can share what I do. Lists I often make multiple lists of characters […]
The Worldbuilder Diaries: Weaponry I realize I’m skipping around in my list of planned topics a bit, but I wanted to discuss one of my favorite elements of worldbuilding this week: Weapons. For me, the choice of weapons is based on three things. The first is centered around the world, and the second around the […]
The Worldbuilder Diaries: Maps and Locations I do most of my location-based worldbuilding while I’m drafting a story. I don’t think I have ever drawn a map first; that’s always a much later step in my process. I start with a list of locations. As I mentioned in the first post of this series, Organization […]
