I often think people make the mistake of looking at Tolkien's published results and copious world-building and thinking it was all done in advance. It's simply not true, and if he could wing big chunks of it, you can (and perhaps should) too.
Reposted from
Gareth Hanrahan
Bonomir shows up at Rivendell and he’s from the land of, uh…. Ond? Stone-land? That’ll do for now.
Then a few years later, we’ve got the complete genealogy of the Kings and Stewards, and an intricate look at Gondor’s history through the centuries.
Then a few years later, we’ve got the complete genealogy of the Kings and Stewards, and an intricate look at Gondor’s history through the centuries.
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In a very matryoshka-doll-esque way, the worlds I build live in me while I live in them as I write, often surprising me with details I'd never thought of consciously.
Much like a real city.
(Formation instinct was a random unplanned impulse invention in Ninefox Gambit that ended up warping the entire plot of the book. Whoops. /o\)
It worked so well because it didn't undermine or undo the stories before, just reframed them.