The wider your range, the more types of stories and types of characters you can animate. Just read this excerpt on choosing the right "voice" for your story, from the chapter on "The Ecosystem of Story," to see what I mean: "Each and every story must be told in the style best suited for it, whether simple and unadorned or convoluted and ornate. That's not to say that Jeff VanderMeer's personal advice to Wonderbook readers isn't spot-on, however.
Le Guin ( A Wizard of Earthsea), among others. Between its covers lie essays from Karen Lord ( Redemption in Indigo), Kim Stanley Robinson ( The Years of Rice and Salt), and Ursula K. So, without putting too fine a point on it, let's just say that Jeff VanderMeer is a modern master of worldbuilding, so obviously you'll want to take his advice if you're in the SpecFic game.Įven putting the illustrations aside, Wonderbook is still chock-full of good advice for any writer who wants to make their book feel like part of a bigger world or story. His wife Ann VanderMeer is the editor of Weird Tales Magazine, and together they have edited several anthologies, including The New Weird, Steampunk, and Best American Fantasy. Annihilation, Authority, Acceptance - among other works of fiction. This handy how-to guide deserves a spot on your writer's bookshelf, but let me tell you why.įirst off, Jeff VanderMeer is the author of Borne, The Steampunk Bible, The Third Bear, This World Is Full of Monsters, City of Saints and Madmen, Komodo, and the Southern Reach Trilogy - A.K.A. There's one book that every speculative fiction writer should read to learn about proper worldbuilding: Wonderbook by Jeff VanderMeer. If worldbuilding gives you an S-class migraine, never fear. It can be tough to know where the line lies between Not Enough and Too Much, and it's altogether too easy to fall into the trap of writing everything there is to know about your created world, but failing to set a story inside it in the process.
As any writer of science fiction or fantasy will tell you, worldbuilding is the most arduous part of composing a new story.
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