I’m working on a short story, “Lari and the Pox” set in a new world. The story is simple enough, it only took half an hour or so to outline. I didn’t outline it until I had most of the world designed. The people are unique and their history has taken shape. I’ve worked out a geography, seasons (five), and unique words to describe the differences between Lari’s world and ours.
All of this I’ve done for a story of less than 5,000 words. I intend to write more stories here, so its not wasted effort. The threads came together so easily, and I lost myself in the act of weaving those threads together to make an entire world come alive. There is now a reason for everything in this short story to happen.
When I was a teenager, I liked to create characters for role playing games. Of course that didn’t satisfy me, so I also had to create worlds for those characters to inhabit. That led me to creating a whole game system and storyline. That storyline eventually evolved into the Renegade Galaxy series of short stories. Someday I’ll have to revisit that universe.
Working on this story and the world I wanted it to inhabit, brought back a flood of memories about how much I enjoy world building. I’ve become a student of the process, diving into geology, sociology, and more to make realistic worlds. I built several worlds for the Magic Unleashed series, but haven’t had the chance to bring them all to life yet.
This short story has reminded me of a joy I’d almost forgotten about. Finding the genuine joy in writing makes the whole process easier. I am happy to have rediscovered this aspect of writing so that I can keep that joy alive, and share it with my audience.