Do you know where mountain ranges are most likely to form? What about beaches? Do you know why the features you put on your map determine the raw resources your populations will have access to? Where is the best place to find iron? Why do people from temperate climates tend to be the ones who take over the world?
And most importantly, how does this impact your story?
Find out now in How To Map!
Introduction
To map or not to map?
For many authors, this is an obvious question that they deal with at some point early in the writing process. For others, it’s not even a question: of course they’re going to use a map to help plan their story! Or else… Of course they’re not! Why on earth would you need a map?
However, the question of whether or not to use a map for your story is more fraught than you might think.
While many authors simply go with their personal preference when it comes to using or including a map, knowing at least the principles behind mapping can lend a richness to your story that may otherwise be missing.
The obvious benefits of constructing a map for your story include being able to keep track of disparate locations, allowing you to calculate distances between them, make sure the sun is setting in the right direction, and other such practical considerations.
However, these same benefits can quickly turn into liabilities if you are someone who’s prone to getting mired in the details: I spent several years constructing detailed maps and backstories for a particular world with a friend of mine which we never ended up writing in, because it always felt like there was something else we needed to establish causation for.
This kind of bogging-in-the-details that sometimes happens with maps can also encourage you to approach your story with your critical brain rather than your creative brain, and this can be problematic because the critical voice is linked to issues of self-doubt, writer blocks, and a generally painful and protracted writing process.
Your creative brain, on the other hand, is the (usually-subconscious) part of your thinking that provides the best plot twists, the ‘realest’ characters, and (usually) the best entertainment, and is responsible for the feeling of ‘flow’ that you get when the words are just pouring onto the page.
(Note that this is not a commentary on plotting-versus-pantsing; there are ways to integrate creative voice into plotting, and plenty of ways to get stuck in the critical voice when you’re ‘pantsing’.)
All of this sounds awfully like an argument against mapping… But it’s not. It’s certainly an argument about putting mapping ahead of writing in terms of importance, but if you are going to write stories that involve non-historical, non-factual cultures, understanding the impact of a map on your story is of paramount importance.
While we all tend to intuit that the geography of a population influences their culture, it’s important to understand that this influence extends further than simply food and clothing.
The ways in which a culture responds to its surrounding geography and climate extend also to expectations around family relationships, attitudes toward health and illness (as well as commonly available treatments), social codes and mores, and more.
And while you certainly don’t have to draw a map to figure out your culture’s climate, it’s an exercise that is worth completing at least a couple of times in your life in order to really internalise the ways that climate and geography can be influential.