Characters and Worldbuilding: Preptober Diaries Week Two
Another week has gone by, so here is my second “Preptober” update for October. This week I worked on three things:
- Collating everything I researched and planned in my Scrivener project so far
- Revisiting my characters and sketching new ones
- Finding gaps in my worldbuilding to work on
In case you missed my previous posts, I will tackle the National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo) challenge during November: writing a 50,000-word book in 30 days.
(If you missed my week one update, follow the link below.)
Collating everything in my Scrivener project
I started a new Scrivener project for my book several months ago when I swore to myself (again) that I would write it. Scrivener is a writing tool by Literature and Latte that has impressed me so far — you can collate everything about your book into one project, including:
- The manuscript
- Research
- Character profiles
- Plot and outline
- Worldbuilding notes
- Settings
This setup makes it so much easier than trawling through multiple folders to find the right document or spreadsheet (which is what I used to do).
Since I already started a fresh project, I went back and collated all the research, character sketches, worldbuilding notes, and anything else I could find. This means I know exactly what I’ve already done and what I still need to do, saving me time if I were to accidentally duplicate something.
Revisiting my characters
Next, I revisited my characters. At this point, they’ve become like old friends to me. One of them even has the same name that I came up with ten years ago!
In my book, there are three points of view, with each character going through their respective character journeys and struggles. I won’t go too much into detail about them here (as I want to avoid spoilers), but I’m very excited at how the story plays out for them!
From there, I revisited other lesser characters (each with more minor struggles of their own), including antagonists and allies. I also created some new characters to flesh out the world in which the main ones live.
Worldbuilding gaps
Finally, after pulling together everything in my Scrivener project and revisiting my characters, I looked at worldbuilding. Any sci-fi/fantasy writer or D&D dungeon master knows how challenging worldbuilding can be — not necessarily because it’s difficult, but because you can get sucked into the finer details.
(In my case, wasting a good hour on naming the months of the year.)
Worldbuilding is necessary for writing fantasy and science fiction, but not as necessary as plot and character are. That’s why, despite the huge list of worldbuilding topics I can cover, I’m choosing to focus on the essentials.
Having already worked on the magic system at the heart of the story, I’m choosing to outline the four different societies and cultures in the world I created. This makes the task of worldbuilding much less daunting, as I can focus on one significant area rather than letting myself get bogged down with the finer details. Those can wait until after the NaNoWriMo draft.
Summary
To summarise this week of “Preptober”, I have:
- Collated everything in my Scrivener project
- Revisited my characters
- Identified significant gaps in my worldbuilding
With week two over, I am starting to get nervous about NaNoWriMo. I can see why “Preptober” is essential for writers to plan carefully so they can start writing from day one.
How are your NaNoWriMo preparations going? I’d love to know what you’ve been focusing on this week!
