Fantasy Is Not for Sissies: Real Rules for Real Worlds© by Holly Lisle
All Rights Reserved
Fantasy writers take a significant amount of crap from SF writers
for what the SF writers perceive as their "fluffy bunny" worldbuilding
and their use of magic as an easy out for solving their characters'
problems. In fact, however, magic is no more of an easy way out
for well-written fantasy than physics is an easy way out for well-written
SF. The following are ten rules that will make your use of magic
in your fantasy novel rigorous, and will save you from the "fluffy-bunny"
label -- and will, at the same time, make your story better, more
entertaining, and more exciting.
1. Nothing comes from nothing.
Also known as There Ain't No Free Lunch. Your magic must come from
something, must be caused by something. You must have a reason why
your world has magic. You don't have to state your reason, but you
have to know it.
2a. Every action has an equal and opposite reaction.
When your characters start using magic, they must be made to pay
for it in some way. If it is effortless, it isn't real, and no one
will believe your story. If your hero does good magic, the use of
this magic will have a detrimental effect somewhere. Conversely,
your villain's magic will have good fallout somewhere.
2b. Actions have consequences.
This rule is the storyteller's best friend - in fantasy, in SF,
in mainstream ... anywhere. Follow the effects of your characters'
actions (from rule 2a) to their logical conclusion. When you make
your characters pay the price for their actions, when you make them
both culpable and responsible, you have made them real. Give much
thought to how the good and the bad of what they do affect them,
and write this.
The most obdurate magical stone
wall created by the mightiest evil wizard had better have a crack
in it that a determined, intelligent hero can find with effort.
4. It ain't that easy.
The glorious hero had better not be able to find it by picking
up a convenient book and, without having any prior magical training,
reading the spell that will bring the wall tumbling down.
If he does find a convenient book, reading it should backfire on
him, leaving him in a worse situation than he was in before.
5. You only get one 'gimme' so don't waste it.
In a world with magic, magic is your 'gimme' - the one thing about
which your reader will unquestioningly suspend disbelief ... so
if you really want to tell a story that uses faster-than-light spaceships,
you need to drop the magic.
6. In a world with magic, magic will touch everything.
Do not lock your magicians in ivory towers and leave them alone
up there with their dusty tomes and arcane paraphernalia. In a world
where magic works, and works well, you'll see folks employing it
in controlling traffic, running their septic tanks, baking bread,
hunting and fishing, and anything else you can imagine.
7. Sufficiently advanced magic is indistinguishable from science.
If your magicians have been working successfully for more than
a few years, they will have surely developed corollaries to the
steam engine, the telephone, the television, the radio, the electric
iron and the toaster, the automobile, computers, the electric guitar,
and the flush commode. They should not still be farking around with
turning straw into gold. They probably won't wear goofy pointed
hats, either, though of course they can if you insist.
8. Magic is NOT your story. People are your story.
There really isn't much else to say about this. Just remember
that, no matter how cool your technology, it will be boring to read
about unless it is background for a character your readers can care
about who has a problem that engages their interest.
9. If your hero creates a 'golly-gee save-the-day gimcrack'
to solve his final problem at the end of your story, IT HAD BETTER
NOT WORK!
Never, ever, give your hero an easy way out. He needs to solve
his problem with his courage and integrity and compassion and native
intelligence, not with a magical fix-it that arrives out of nowhere
for no reason other than that you got him into a jam you can't figure
out how to get him out of.
10. Every rule has its exception, but before you decide to be
the exception, you need to spend some time using the rule.
Break 'em all if you want - but don't break 'em all in the same
story, know which rule you're breaking when, and only break a rule
because you have a damned good reason to.
11. All other rules for writing every other type of fiction
also apply.
ALL of them. And this is the exception to rule ten. There's no
exception.
So follow the link below to the article on developing logical ecosystems,
because even in a book about magic, you still have to have an environment
that could really work. Pay attention to the demands of plot, characterization,
grammar, and spelling. Remember to tell a good story. Make sure
that when you're telling it, it is about something. Know what you
theme is. And finally, have fun while you're doing it.
Worldbuilding -- Rollicking
Rules of Ecosystems>>
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