Writing From Place: My Creative Process

After a break of several years from writing fiction, I’m back in the saddle. Of course, over that time, the ideas have been simmering, and I now find myself working on several books all at once.

The typing may have ceased, but the ideas certainly didn’t.

Most of my story ideas come to me the same way: through worldbuilding. I doubt that’s going to surprise anyone. “Imagine a world where….” followed by “What kind of characters would live in this world?” ending with “What would these characters choose to do?” Sometimes, my ideas are born from a literal place. A single location that appears in my head, and slowly expands into the landscape beyond.

And so, whenever I’m writing, the first thing I do is draw the map.

I’ve talked many times about finding stories in maps, and that is exactly the way I work myself. I start with the main location, and extend the rivers, the roads, the forests, and mountain ranges outward, adding other towns, lakes, and finding all the spaces that already have stories waiting to happen.

Somehow, my maps write as much of the story as I do.

It would be reasonable to assume that I’ve only written this way since I started drawing maps in 2020. But that’s not the case. My ideas have been born from worldbuilding ever since I started writing. It’s a rare occurrence that a character speaks to me before the world does.

I do want to express that my creative process is no better or worse than anyone else’s, it is simply mine. It’s the way my brain works, and it’s the thing my imagination latches onto. Many writers begin with a character, or a scene, or a line of dialogue. There is no correct way to do this, merely the way that works for you.

While I’m asking “What might happen in this place?” another author is asking “What kind of person is this?” They are equally good questions to jump off from.

But I find that not many people start their stories from worldbuilding or, at least, they don’t realise that’s what they’re doing. When I’m teaching workshops, and I ask people to create a place from a random name on a prompt card, I love seeing that moment of realisation when they’ve invented history, lore, characters, and plot all from a simple name. Just a place name. Nothing more.

The writing world is full of ‘rules’, and you’ll find countless authors eager to tell you what they are. I believe we need more authors telling people to break those rules, bend them, reshape them, or ignore them entirely.

I still see many people asserting that plotting is the correct way to write. Assuming that discovery writers will quickly become plotters if they only learn the process. Assuming that they are only discovery writers due to their naivety, inexperience, or even stupidity. I still see many people asserting that momentum is everything, and you mustn’t ever stop writing to find the perfect name, that using a placeholder is the correct way. Likewise, that editing as you write is a progress killer, and something no writer should ever engage in.

I say this: find your own weird ways. If it works for you, it is correct. If it gets the story written, it is correct. And if you’re brave enough, be open about your weird little ways. Be open about the ‘rules’ you break.

Because sometimes we need to see someone else break the rules before we realise we can too.