Let it Go
It’s been a while since I published a post on Universe Factory, and it’s no coincidence that this drought coincided with a large increase in my workload, for various reasons. I had to cut the time I had dedicated to certain activities, including some worldbuilding. Regular readers of the blog may remember that I had written a couple of short chapters detailing the struggle of teens trying to survive in the aftermath of a plague that killed off everyone older than 25. This world was the main casualty of this period of inactivity: A couple weeks ago, I decided to kill that project off.
Why did this happen, and what can I do to prevent it in the future? Obviously, time was a major factor. But some introspection showed that there were other problems at work, some obvious, others not so much so. This post details the results of that introspection: What went wrong, why it went wrong, and how it can be avoided in the future.
The first big problem I identified was one I had seen coming a while ago, and it had more to do with the story I was writing than the world itself. I had known for some time that the plot was in pretty bad shape; I had no idea where the story would lead, because I hadn’t planned out the events and challenges the characters would face over the long term. I once even simply wrote without knowing where the story would take my characters. In general, this isn’t a bad idea; it can often lead to great things.
The problem here was that this stream-of-consciousness writing led me to a cliffhanger, and a rather ridiculous one: A man hiding in a chamber the size of a broom cupboard, who by all logic should be dead. This draws in the audience, because the solution isn’t at all apparent. The thing is, it wasn’t apparent to me, either. I had challenged myself to solve the problem, but I couldn’t figure it out. Other portions of the story were similarly murky.
The major issues lay in the world itself. In the above case, I would normally just toss aside part of the story, and start again, keeping a little bit of what I had already created. However, this wasn’t so simple. For one, the world contained contradictions, and problems I just couldn’t solve. One outstanding one was that I had never created a plausible non-magical explanation for the plague, and couldn’t seem to find a satisfactory way out. Another had to do with the geography of the world, and the large plain I had envisioned to the west, separating the last frontier outposts from a huge mountain range. I had problems figuring out how the plain could have formed and how the frontier towns could have undergone the social evolution I had planned.
The biggest difficulty, as far as I can tell, was unrelated to anything I’ve mentioned so far. It had to deal with my passion for the world. In general, I love medieval worlds, which probably comes from my love of Tolkien’s Middle-Earth. But this world simply didn’t strike me as quite so interesting. A story should draw in its audience, and make them want to see what will happen. They need to have some sort of emotional investment in how events will play out. Yet I, the worldbuilder, couldn’t seem to develop the investment. If I didn’t have a passion for the world, how could I expect others to?
My loss of interest likely stemmed in part from the sharp decrease in the amount of time I had available to develop this world. I figure that when I had the time again, I could return to it, and once more create a mystical land out of my imagination. And so I shelved it — or, to use some political lingo, I “indefinitely suspended” my efforts.
This doesn’t mean that I won’t return to it. I hate to give up on something I’ve put so much work into; it just seems like such a waste. Besides, this world isn’t entirely uninteresting. The idea of the plague seems to be unique, and it’s worth exploring some more, potentially with modifications. So I’m not giving up on the story or the world. I just need to wait until I feel passionate about it again. In the meanwhile, I have some other projects to attend to.
So, how can I — and you — avoid this in the future? I don’t have all the answers to this, because I haven’t done any work on my other ideas yet since shelving the project. I do have some ideas, though, some of which should be obvious:
- Plan ahead. This removes a lot of uncertainty when it comes to developing a plotline, which can raise your morale when things get tough and obstacles seem insurmountable.
- Don’t take breaks. If possible, keep worldbuilding — in the same world. This will both keep the creative juices flowing and mean that your attention won’t be diverted elsewhere.
- Stop if you’re not having fun. This doesn’t mean you should stop work entirely, just that you shouldn’t develop the world if your heart isn’t into it. Then it becomes tedium, leading to worse results.
Hopefully, following this advice will lead to better results in the future. It is, however, important to know when you should stop work on a world — when, in other words, to let it go.
