It's Life Jim, But Not As We Know It

I read this brilliant post by Kylie Griffin about 'World Building' in writing. It mentions how important the setting of a novel is & got me pondering. Actually pretty much anything gets me pondering. It doesn't take very much at all for me to drift off. I'm convinced I live in my own head. But the post made me think about the settings/worlds that inspire me.

Everyone, but everyone should know Terry Prachett. And everyone including the long dead Ancient Egyptians should read the Discworld series. This setting is so intricate I'd like to jump ship and live in Ankh Morpork, reside at the Unseen University (how I wish mine was unseen, particularly by me)and hang out with Death. Pratchett manages to create a setting thats the most intricately designed yet easy to understand one I've ever seen. The Discworld is logically flawed, impossible but undeniable. I'm convinced somewhere out there it exists. Its fantasy written by a master & I'd read him all day if I didnt have to do things occasionally, like breathe.

I fell hard and fast for Margaret Atwood when I was in Year 12. We were given 'The Handmaids Tale' for our text and told to read a chapter a night. I read the whole thing in a day. Gilead was frighteningly real and still is. The setting was as shocking as OfFred's tale. A future we could potentially inhabit. One of her newest - 'Oryx and Crake' scared the living daylights out of me with its setting. A new race of genetically created humans peacefully exist while the remaining humans advance themselves out of existence. Archaeology turns to rubble and one man is left watching all the pieces of brilliance shatter. The setting is terrifying and it shadows through all of Jimmy's thoughts.



Anne Rice and I met some long years back with Interview with the Vampire. The Godmother of Vampires (no, not Meyer. Go sit down. Blasphemer)takes our world, right now, the heartbeat of every city and succinctly opens up the supernatural the same way we open up a tin. Unless you're me, in which case you do it with plenty of swearing, elbow grease and finally hand it over to someone else. Vampires slip into our world and the setting becomes somehow sharper, somehow prettier when its viewed through immortal eyes. I love her settings as much as I love her Facebook updates.

Reading through the link, it shows just how important the settings are. Like a separate voice for someone who never shows their face.