Julie Artz helps writers who dream of a life spent telling stories that matter slay their doubt demons so they can send their work out into the world with confidence. An active member of the writing community, she has volunteered for SCBWI, TeenPit, and Pitch Wars and is a member of EFA, the Authors Guild, and AWP. A social and environmental justice minded story geek, Julie lives in an enchanted forest outside of Seattle, Washington, with her husband, two strong-willed teenagers, and a couple of naughty furry familiars. Check out her weekly newsletter, Wyrd Words Weekly, and subscribe today.
[Wyrd Words Weekly] - Additional world-building resources, including one from yours truly
Hello Reader,
It may be giving you too close a look at the interior of my writer brain, but I spent quite a lot of time going down a research rabbit hole to determine the best spelling of worldbuilding/world building/world-building before writing this week's newsletter. I mean, if I'm going to teach people about world-building, and work in the publishing industry, I should at least be able to spell it, right? Wrong!
I checked out some of my favorite resources on it to see how they were using the term and although my search yielded absolutely no clarity on the matter at hand, it did produce a great list of additional resources that I'm of course sharing with all of you:
- Listen to world-building goddess N. K. Jemisin build a world with Ezra Klein on Vox: https://podcasts.apple.com/podcast/id1081584611?ct=podlink&mt=2&i=1000418571825
- N.K. Jemisin also shares the course materials that go with this talk here: https://nkjemisin.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/08/WDWebinar.pdf
- Moriah Richards of Writers Digest has a great intro series to world-building that begins here: https://www.writersdigest.com/write-better-fiction/what-is-world-building
- If you're looking for something you can hold in your hands, check out Wonderbook by Jeff VanderMeer--it's as lovely as it is helpful.
Anyhow, I flipped the magic coin I keep at my desk and it decided that it loves a good hyphen, so world-building it is. Yet another example of my readers reeping benefits from my navel gazing and overthinking. Huzzah!
One last thought on world-building from one of my favorite irreverant voices in the writing community, Chuck Wendig:
A Special World-Building Offer
If you've enjoyed this series of world-buliding missives but are looking for a deep dive into how to turn the big-picture guidelines--avoid stereotypes and freshen tropes and be specific, etc.,--into actionable steps you can take to plan your world, I hope you'll join me on Saturday, October 29, at 1pm Pacific for a 90-minute webinar titled Plan Now, Play Later: a World-Building Primer.
Wyrd Words Weekly subscribers can use the code WyrdWordsWeekly to receive a $10 discount off the $25 list price for this webinar as a thank you for being part of my writing community.
And there's more! In celebration of the upcoming webinar, my friends Angela Ackerman and Becca Puglisi, creators of the best-selling Emotion Thesaurus series, would like to offer all webinar registrants 50% off a one-month subscription to their One Stop for Writers tool.
I'll be introducing their robust world-building tool, which is just one piece of One Stop for Writers, toward the end of the webinar, but it's a great place to create and organize information as you plan your story.
Don't delay, register today!
Next Month on Twitter!
Whether you're getting ready to dive into #preptober as you plan a new story or elsewhere in the writing process at the moment, I hope you enjoyed this month's series on world-building. I'll be over on Twitter for the next two months offering a daily writing tip first for #preptober, then for #nanowrimo. Come find me at https://twitter.com/julieartz if you don't already follow me there.
Hope to see you there!
Warmly,
Julie
PS - If you enjoy Wyrd Words Weekly, I'd really appreciate it if you would tell a friend. Thanks in advance for forwarding this email to them. They can also subscribe to my weekly newsletter here.
Julie Artz | author, editor, book coach, dragon
Julie Artz helps writers who dream of a life spent telling stories that matter slay their doubt demons so they can send their work out into the world with confidence. An active member of the writing community, she has volunteered for SCBWI, TeenPit, and Pitch Wars and is a member of EFA, the Authors Guild, and AWP. A social and environmental justice minded story geek, Julie lives in an enchanted forest outside of Seattle, Washington, with her husband, two strong-willed teenagers, and a couple of naughty furry familiars. Check out her weekly newsletter, Wyrd Words Weekly, and subscribe today.
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