So, You Want to Write a Fantasy Book? Part 1 Story as a Whole: A Writing Prompt Journal to help you develop your characters, setting, and antagonists, and design your own world maps

by Stefan Coleman

So, you want to write a fantasy book, eh? Have you thought about it for a while, or has a rush of inspiration hit you and now you feel called to respond? Have you got a cool idea in mind, characters you want to take the page, an antagonist that will put Darth Vader to shame, and a setting to rival Middle Earth, or are you still figuring those out?

If you’re one of the ones still figuring things out, awesome, you might get the most out of this book, and I encourage you to stick around to the end. If you already have some of these in mind, well, I think this can help make them more.

In this book, you’ll This journal serves a few purposes. First, it's a prompt journal, meaning it gets you writing, but without the expectation that you need to write a lot. I leave you only a page for the various prompts, after all, so it's not meant to be more than that. It's a prompt journal that builds on each other, though, so if you want to go into a lot of detail about a character, that's alright, there are more prompts for them.

Second, this is a tool for developing a fantasy story, novel, or even a saga. The questions posed about the main character can easily be asked about any of your other characters, which will help to bring out their character better. The questions posed about the setting will help you figure out the culture and history, and the questions about the antagonist will help you figure out what kind of conflict you want your story to have. At the end, the map tutorial will help bring your vision of the world to life in a physical way.

Thirdly, this is a tool to combat writer's block. Yes, you heard me correctly. Writer's block usually comes when our characters get into a situation, and then we don't know where to go from there, so we don't do anything thinking the idea will come, but then it doesn't, and then we don't write... and it sucks. You hear that this can be countered by having an organized outline at the beginning and then following it, but I don't agree. I believe the solution lies not in having the story figured out, but having the characters figured out. When we know who our characters are, what their history is, what their personality is, how they would react to situations, etc. then when we get into those situations and just ask, "what would my main character do," we find the solution is right there, whether it's what we intended or not.

Last, for more explanations on the various prompts, I'm developing them on my YouTube channel, so check this out if you need some guidance on getting started

254 pages, Kindle Edition

Published January 29, 2022

About the author

Stefan Coleman is an author, a graphic designer, and substitute teacher from the frozen wilderness of Alaska. Although initially a mathematics major, a random creative writing class necessary to fill a hole in his schedule awakened his passion for writing, and the works of Tolkien, CS Lewis, and Timothy Zahn have kept it burning.

In his spare time, he loves photography and sharing it with the hope people can still find the sun through whatever clouds are going on in their lives. He’d love to connect, and he can be found on Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook, at firebrand101.