by Jill Williamson | Jan 31, 2024 | Creativity, Elements of Fiction, Fantasy, Guest Posts, Learning from Other Authors, Plot, Speculative Fiction, Story Ideas, Story Structure, Writing
Ellen McGinty is an author and editor of Young Adult fantasy and historical fiction. She lives in the Tokyo metropolis with her husband, three boys, and a hypoallergenic cat. When not writing or editing, you can find her exploring the wilds of Japan with an abundance...
by Stephanie Morrill | Oct 25, 2023 | Characters, Fantasy, Guest Posts, Point of View
Gillian Bronte Adams writes YA epic fantasy novels, including the award-winning Of Fire and Ash and The Songkeeper Chronicles. She loves strong coffee, desert hikes, and trying out new soup recipes on crisp fall nights. Her favorite books are the ones that...
by Jill Williamson | May 24, 2023 | Brainstorming, Creativity, Fantasy, Setting, World Building, Writing Exercise
Last week, I wrote a post called Creating a Map for Your World: How to Get Started, which was the first half of two-week series on map-making for novelists. Today we are going deeper. We’re going to talk about what kinds of details you can add to your maps and...
by Jill Williamson | May 17, 2023 | Brainstorming, Creativity, Fantasy, Speculative Fiction, World Building
I’m a storyworld first author. This means, I must spend time creating my world before I can start writing. For me, this process usually starts with drawing a map. It’s no secret how much I love book maps, so I’m going to post about them for the next...
by Stephanie Morrill | Mar 1, 2023 | First Drafts, Genres, Historical
I’ve noticed over the years that writers tend to have a genre that comes naturally to them. For me, it’s contemporary YA. Even before I knew that YA contemporary fiction existed (true story: I thought I invented the young adult genre) most of my stories came out as YA...
by Jill Williamson | Dec 21, 2022 | Brainstorming, Creativity, Fantasy, Setting, World Building, Writing Tools
If you missed the first two posts in this series, you can check them out here: Geography for Worldbuilding, Part OneGeography for World-Building, Part Two: Climate, Weather, and Biomes When I drew my very first fantasy map, I knew it needed water. My world was a...
