#lessons learned in #worldbuilding for #writing #fantasy #fiction: #Uprooted by @naominovik

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When I find out an author is a big fan of MY favorite author Diana Wynne Jones, then I am required to check him/her out. ‘Tis Writer’s Law….or something. Shush, I did it, and I’m not sorry I did it because Naomi Novik’s Uprooted has such a STELLAR first paragraph you can’t help but be invested. It’s not a matter of wit, or intrigue, or setting. It’s the world-building within each sentence that plants the seeds of interest in readers to blossom in nearly no time at all.

Let me share the paragraph with you, and then we can break this sucker down.

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Our Dragon doesn’t eat the girls he takes, no matter what stories they tell outside our valley. We hear them sometimes, from travelers passing through. They talk as though we were doing human sacrifice, and he were a real dragon. Of course that’s not true: he may be a wizard and immortal, but he’s still a man, and our fathers would band together and kill him if he wanted to eat one of us every ten years. He protects us against the Wood, and we’re grateful, but not that grateful.

No sweeping descriptions of the world. No colorful portraits of characters. Yet Naomi Novik fills this paragraph with information other authors would stretch across a dozen pages.

Our Dragon. A capitalized “d” means this isn’t a typical beast. This is a title, or a name, and this Dragon thing belongs, in some fashion, to the group of which the narrator’s a part.

Our Dragon doesn’t eat the girls he takes. Right here, Novik won me over. How, just how many told tales have a dragon taking a person to eat it? It’s a trope, a cliche, a whatever-that-term-is. When we hear about dragons taking girls, we expect to hear about bones and death and the like. But Novik has taken this expectation, turned it on its head, and given us an entirely unexpected payoff. One sentence in, and we’re being told we can’t abide by the “typical” fantasy tropes.

…no matter what stories they tell outside our valley. Now we begin to get a sense of space, a little of time. Not a technological age, certainly, if stories can run rampant outside an area without correction. We’re also in a larger space–the narrator didn’t say “village,” or “town,” or even “city.” If there was only one community, the narrator would have used  a term to say as much. So, we can conclude we’re dealing with multiple communities in this space.

We hear them sometimes, from travelers passing through. They talk as though we were doing human sacrifice, and he were a real dragon. Again, we get a sense this is not a technological era. We also begin to get a sense of our narrator–“as though we were doing human sacrifice” has this harrumphing attitude behind it. The narrator scoffs the very idea that there’d be a “real dragon” involved, let alone any sort of willful killing.

Of course that’s not true: he may be a wizard and immortal, but he’s still a man, and our fathers would band together and kill him if he wanted to eat one of us every ten years. I love this sentence! We have another taste of the narrator’s attitude with the “of course,” treating any ignorant outsider with disdain. We also learn what “Our Dragon” is: a wizard, immortal, man. (By the way, I love how that’s said: “he may be a wizard and immortal”–like this is normal. It’s the narrator’s normal, clearly, but the fact the narrator acts like this is the normal gives readers yet another taste of what Uprooted’s world is like.) The fact that a mob of fathers could take on a wizard also gives us a sense of the narrator’s respect for the men in her valley. Lastly, we learn our narrator is a girl with the “eat one of us.” So, we know this is a girl that’s been raised in a society that’s had to offer their daughters every ten years to a wizard.

Why?

He protects us against the Wood. Hold on. Wood? What Wood? Woods are common in fantasy, sure. Sometimes they’re just woods, and sometimes they harbor dangerous characters. But the narrator isn’t talking about what lives in the Wood. She’s talking about the Wood itself. Something about the Wood is so powerful and so dangerous that it requires a wizard’s protection in order for people to live in this valley.

He protects us against the Wood, and we’re grateful, but not that grateful. Okay, I just love the narrator’s attitude here. Yes, she’s emphasizing that the valley folk aren’t willing to let their daughters be killed every ten years, but there’s a quirky snottiness here I really dig. This is a girl who’s not afraid to speak her mind about what sounds like a cornered life: growing up near a dangerous Wood, knowing you might be taken away from everything you know and love by a wizard for ten years. She should be happy her people are protected, and she knows it.

But she ain’t exactly pleased with her potential destiny, either.

Novik grows a beautifully unique tale with Uprooted, one I’m always eager to recommend to those who love fantasy. For those who love to write other genres, I’d still recommend this book to study its craft. This first paragraph shows what can be done if one’s not just thinking about establishing intrigue, or painting a scene, or introducing a character. Sometimes it takes all three elements to grow a paragraph that is truly extraordinary.

PS: I’ve got a new monthly newsletter to share updates on my fiction as well as other writers. If you’d like to spread the word about your work, just drop me a line at jeanleesworld@gmail.com Click here to subscribe to the newsletter.

Read on, share on, and write on, my friends!

27 thoughts on “#lessons learned in #worldbuilding for #writing #fantasy #fiction: #Uprooted by @naominovik”

    • I know, right? It’s easy enough to just read on and enter the narrator’s situation, but when I set about to writing this post on the first chapter I realized there was so much in the first paragraph I wanted to stay there and dissect it. This kind of balance in narrative elements takes a LOT of effort, I think, and is worth the notice. 🙂
      Thanks for reading, by the by. How’s life on the homefront?

      Liked by 2 people

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      • Oh eeesh. Never fun. My mother’s dog is such a curmudgeon now that if I bring my sons over, he wants to hide in the car. Not that they ever touch him, to be clear–they really don’t have much interest in animals, being little gearheads. But they are noisy. Like 100 decibels of noisy. And that ol’ dog ain’t gonna take their noise anymore.
        Unlike Blondie whom he loves, because she’s quiet….sometimes. 🙂 xxxxxxxxxxx

        Liked by 1 person

  3. I really like how you break down each phrase and sentence and explore how and why it works. Such a useful exercise for my own writing! And wow, how have I not heard of this author before? She looks amazing! Added to the top of my wish list — thanks for the recommendation!

    Liked by 1 person

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      • I like that better, too. If you did the whole chapter, you’d have to be more general, or risk writing a chapter-long blog post! This way you could really get down into the details, which is great.

        Liked by 1 person

      • Oh my gosh, I know! I’ve written enough looooong blog posts for one year, thank you very much. 😛 And I like emphasizing the importance of individual words. As a writer, I find myself lackadaisical about language at times, while other times so stuck on finding another way to say “was ___” that I won’t even notice my son running up to me to tackle me away from the computer. 🙂

        Liked by 1 person

    • Thank you so much! And yes, I’ve wondered that, too. There’s such precision with these language choices. I could imagine that the first line came with a Eureka sort of ease, but then everything else needed to pace ever so carefully from there…

      Liked by 1 person

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  5. I enjoyed this book, though some of the dark parts made me feel the need to eat chocolate and watch My Little Ponies to recover! Nice analysis, as always. The hubby is wondering if the ARC copies are paper or electronic (or we can wait to find out lol) – he’s champing at the bit to check it out, but getting him to sit down to a screen post-work-hours is NOT easy, so his glowing review might have to wait for official release date. Mine, on the other hand… 😉

    Liked by 1 person

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  7. As ever, you point me in the direction of something intriguing. I’ve read through the opening on Amazon, and now will have to buy it. Your analysis is masterly, and I so agree, recognising how much craft has gone into a piece of writing outweighs considerations about genre. This is beautiful, engaging and economical writing.

    Liked by 1 person

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    • It really is! What gets me most of all, honestly, is the narrator’s attitude still shines through in this economical writing. She could have thrown in all sorts of asides and snark–I probably would have ;)–but instead uses just a few phrases for us to get a sense of what this girl is like. And it’s totally effective. 🙂

      Liked by 1 person

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  9. Pingback: A #writer’s thoughts on boundaries in #magic. Plus a #CoverReveal and #ARC access to my new #YA #Fantasy #Novel! | Jean Lee's World

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