Over this course, you’ll have planned out how much detail and worldbuilding you need to know in order to write your novel.
In this last part, let’s look at how much you need to put in the novel, specifically how much detail you need to go into.
The frantic mining of the oceans in the previous century to provide oxygen for the atmospheres of the new planets had made their decline swift and irreversible, and with their death had come climatic and other geophysical changes which ensured the extinction of Earth itself. As the oxygen extracted electrolytically from seawater was compressed and shipped away, the hydrogen released was discharged into the atmosphere. Eventually only a narrow layer of denser, oxygen-containing air was left, little more than a mile in depth, and those people remaining on Earth were forced to retreat into the ocean beds, abandoning the poisoned continental tables.
Deep End – JG Ballard
This is going to depend on a few things. First, think about your genre. Some genres generally include more detail that others, with sci-fi and fantasy right up there, as the quote above shows! You still need to decide on the level of detail whatever your genre, though, and it will also depend on the subgenre. Do a bit of research. Flick through your favourite books and take a note of how much detail there is, and the kind of detail you see – do they focus on descriptions of tech, nature, people? Make sure to go outside of your favourites as well, as your faves might well have a similar level of detail. This will all give you an idea of what readers of your genre will expect.
It’s worth considering the absolute basics that the reader needs to know about your world in order to enjoy the story. Sometimes it’s all too easy to assume that because we know a thing, that our readers will too. That’s not just with stuff you’ve made up, either – if it’s not common knowledge, it’s worth lingering over briefly to make sure everyone is up to speed. It can help to get a beta reader or at least a friend to help out with this, especially if you’ve been editing. More than once, my writer’s group has pointed out instances where the important worldbuilding got chopped in the edit and I forgot to put it back in.
Also consider how your point-of-view character thinks. Are they the sort of person to be able to recognise cloth-of-gold or a flux capacitor? Would they wax lyrical about a birch tree with its white trunk and pointed leaves and go into detail about its biology, or would their knowledge end in ‘tree’?
What kind of level do you like to write? Do you love diving deep or are you more of a surface detail kind of person? However much you do – or don’t – like to write, try to keep in mind that the book is for your readers. You never have to keep to genre expectations, but it’s a good idea to keep them in mind. Having said that, if you hate writing lengthy descriptions, that’s going to come across in your writing. Try to find a balance.
And lastly, when it comes to editing, sometimes you have to kill your darlings. Maybe you adore that three-paragraph description of your favourite character, but is it needed? How about that page long infodump about your starship’s propulsion? Will your readers revel in it, or will they skip over it?
In the end, it’s your choice – but hopefully this course will help with making those choices a little easier.