McAnally's (The Community Pub) > Author Craft

Geography

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Lord Rae:
How do you handle layout of towns/cities/rivers in a fictional setting? Do you create a map of your own? Or do you wing it?

Quantus:
I find a map, even a rough sketch is crucial for me to keep the distances and directions and landmarks all straight.  But I dig on the worldbuilding side of things more than most, and would make such a map for all my DnD campaigns as well.  You can still "wing it" as necessary by adding things as the need arises, but it keeps you from accidentally saying west instead of east, or forgetting that you put a big river or mountain range in the way of your march or whatever. 

Lanodantheon:
Visual representations are the best way to go, though if you do wing it you should keep good notes.


If I remember correct, the maps in the current editions of Lord of The Rings weren't commissioned by Tolkien. They were extrapolated by a fan working on her Masters and she just dug through the original text and did all the math.


I myself will be using maps on my future fictional projects, even just sketches of blobs with inaccurate scales because they are handy and because in real life, work with maps. It does make all the different in the world if you are describing a group of characters who are looking from one end of a city to another, but on the map they would logically be looking across the major sky-scraping landmark, which would block their view entirely.

Quantus:
On the other hand, if your story only sees one or two of the locations or lanmarks, and the rest are only referenced in passing it may not be as big an issue, as if there is actual travel involved, or multiple POV's.  But again for me teh actual map is by far the easiest way to keep it all straight in my head.

the neurovore of Zur-En-Aargh:
Do whatever you need to keep it straight in your head, but only put in the text what that story needs.

personally, I really don't like maps in books, and I have a perverse fondness for stories set in locations where the geography cannot actually be mapped in a consistent logical sense.

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