Building a fictional village

Published: Jul 12, 2024 by

There is a special feeling about opening a fantasy book and seeing a map, laying out all the different regions for the reader to see. Taking in the new and unusual names of the towns and cities, seeing the winding rivers, epic mountain ranges and the deep dark forests, wondering where the story you are about to read will take you.

When writing Trouble at the Church, there was the feeling of creating a universe, albeit much smaller than any epic fantasy novel. The layout was initially clear, but as it started growing with new locations being added as the story developed there was a need to ensure consistency.

I’m sure any author will say how important their notes are in keeping consistency in their writing, having something they can quickly refer to that will reinforce the earlier decisions they have made. For Trouble at the church, there was a simple bullet point list of character names and their roles in the story. These were referred to often and new details added as time went on.

This worked well for the characters, but writing notes for locations quickly became complex and cumbersome to maintain.

Has someone in the street ever stopped and asked you for directions?

How do I get to the cafe? Or where is the nearest shop?

You might say something like, “Take the second left and go straight for a bit, then bare left at the fork.”. Then the person walks off and you suddenly think to yourself, was it the second left or the third left? There is a little lane that shouldn’t really be considered a left turn, but it could be.

The point is, it’s easy to get confused with directions. Wouldn’t it be easier with a map?

To help improve the notes being used, a simple sketch was made to outline the village of Little-Astwick. Here is that simple sketch.

Click the image to enlarge.

As you can see, I’m not good at drawing. The artwork needs a lot more time spent on it by a professional artist to make it worthy of inclusion in a book, but it is also not yet finished because the series has not yet finished.

The second in the series is being written at the same time this blog post is being written. This will add further details to the map as the story fully forms, as well as hinting at ideas for future books in the series.

Looking at the sketch reminded me of the ‘fog of war’ in computer games. The blank edges of the map hide new areas to explore and reveal new adventures. The feeling of anticipation builds, until you can finally reach the new area and reveal it, unsure if there will be useful resources or enemies lying in wait.

The aim is that there will one day be a proper map that can be included with the books, showing the full features of the village and all the locations in the story.