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Fantasy Worldbuilding Workbook
Bring your worlds to life!
Take your worlds to the next level in half the time with this comprehensive worldbuilding guidebook. For authors, DMs, and serious gamers, The Worldbuilding Workbook personalizes the process with over 750 worldbuilding prompts.
By establishing your goals, building a bible, combining fantasy conceits and analogue cultures, top-down and bottom-up strategies, and basic story structure, you’ll hone your own personal process to create new creatures, magic systems, and societies.
With over 25 infographics, illustrations, and charts, you’ll soon be fashioning unforgettable new fantasy worlds.
Take your worlds to the next level in half the time with this comprehensive worldbuilding guidebook. For authors, DMs, and serious gamers, The Worldbuilding Workbook personalizes the process with over 750 worldbuilding prompts.
By establishing your goals, building a bible, combining fantasy conceits and analogue cultures, top-down and bottom-up strategies, and basic story structure, you’ll hone your own personal process to create new creatures, magic systems, and societies.
With over 25 infographics, illustrations, and charts, you’ll soon be fashioning unforgettable new fantasy worlds.
195 pages, Kindle Edition
Published August 12, 2021
95 people are currently reading
373 people want to read
About the author
M.D. Presley
8 books83 followersNever passing up the opportunity to speak about himself in the third person, M.D. Presley is not nearly as clever as he thinks he is. Born and raised in Texas, he spent several years on the East Coast and now waits for the West Coast to shake him loose. His favorite words include defenestrate, callipygian, and Algonquin. The fact that monosyllabic is such a long word keeps him up at night.
And no, he's not related to Elvis. Thanks for asking though.
And no, he's not related to Elvis. Thanks for asking though.
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Displaying 1 - 8 of 8 reviews
August 26, 2021
Synopsis
This book is a collection of essays based on the author’s vast knowledge and appreciation for worldbuilding in fantasy. Also contained with are sources for worldbuilding prompts and diagrams to make this not only a useful guide to any writer, but also to foster an appreciation in the reader for the sheer colossal task authors have in setting out their fictional worlds.
Review
Two disclaimers. One, I received an e-ARC copy from the author although this has in no way influenced this review. Two, I have been using this book to help plan for our FanFiAddict D&D group as I feel a guidebook like this needs to be “playtested” for any review to be genuine. On we go …
M.D. Presley is, in his own words, our worldbuilding travel agent. The purpose of this book is, through a series of essays on the facets of worldbuilding and an extensive set of worldbuilding prompts, to help guide the writer, reader, and gamer build better, richer worlds in their stories. It sounds simple, right? Wrong.
Presley has taken great care in diligently examining the art of worldbuilding under a microscope. The book revolves around the core assumption that there are two major worldbuilding strategies: top-down (everything is intricately planned well in advance, allowing for every possible detail to be thought out) and bottom-up (us pantsers who just write and let the world flow). What makes the book particularly useful is how Presley’s examination of his research on worldbuilding is juxtaposed by examples from multiple fantasy worlds and authors. It makes the great stream of information a lot easier to digest.
A huge takeaway for me was Presley’s statement: “Anecdotally, worldbuilding is known as an iceberg because you only use 10% of the information in your story itself.” It shows that there is more to any story than what we consume on the page or screen.
This won’t be a book you sit and read in one go; that’s not what it’s for. It’s a useful worldbuilding bible, which, incidentally, is the most useful chapter I found in the book. Presley writes of creating bibles that note every imaginable detail of your world. The extensive list of worldbuilding prompts that follow helps to create your own fantasy world bible and a richer world to explore. This is an invaluable skill and one Presley imparts on the reader well.
Worldbuilding for Fantasy Fans and Authors will help you to create a more interesting and diverse world in your writing and storytelling, without question. It’s not something you’ll read by the pool on holiday but fans will certainly find an appreciation for the worldbuilding of their favourite authors after reading the book.
At the price listed on Kindle for this one, it’s an absolute steal.
This book is a collection of essays based on the author’s vast knowledge and appreciation for worldbuilding in fantasy. Also contained with are sources for worldbuilding prompts and diagrams to make this not only a useful guide to any writer, but also to foster an appreciation in the reader for the sheer colossal task authors have in setting out their fictional worlds.
Review
Two disclaimers. One, I received an e-ARC copy from the author although this has in no way influenced this review. Two, I have been using this book to help plan for our FanFiAddict D&D group as I feel a guidebook like this needs to be “playtested” for any review to be genuine. On we go …
M.D. Presley is, in his own words, our worldbuilding travel agent. The purpose of this book is, through a series of essays on the facets of worldbuilding and an extensive set of worldbuilding prompts, to help guide the writer, reader, and gamer build better, richer worlds in their stories. It sounds simple, right? Wrong.
Presley has taken great care in diligently examining the art of worldbuilding under a microscope. The book revolves around the core assumption that there are two major worldbuilding strategies: top-down (everything is intricately planned well in advance, allowing for every possible detail to be thought out) and bottom-up (us pantsers who just write and let the world flow). What makes the book particularly useful is how Presley’s examination of his research on worldbuilding is juxtaposed by examples from multiple fantasy worlds and authors. It makes the great stream of information a lot easier to digest.
A huge takeaway for me was Presley’s statement: “Anecdotally, worldbuilding is known as an iceberg because you only use 10% of the information in your story itself.” It shows that there is more to any story than what we consume on the page or screen.
This won’t be a book you sit and read in one go; that’s not what it’s for. It’s a useful worldbuilding bible, which, incidentally, is the most useful chapter I found in the book. Presley writes of creating bibles that note every imaginable detail of your world. The extensive list of worldbuilding prompts that follow helps to create your own fantasy world bible and a richer world to explore. This is an invaluable skill and one Presley imparts on the reader well.
Worldbuilding for Fantasy Fans and Authors will help you to create a more interesting and diverse world in your writing and storytelling, without question. It’s not something you’ll read by the pool on holiday but fans will certainly find an appreciation for the worldbuilding of their favourite authors after reading the book.
At the price listed on Kindle for this one, it’s an absolute steal.
September 29, 2021
This is a great tool to have around, learn from, and use as a writer. I'm always on the lookout for writing aids and this is one I think I'll be referring to and using often. Even though this is a second book, you can easily read and use it without having checked out the first book. In this workbook, it covers everything to do with fantasy worldbuilding, it's very detailed and extensive and chock full of so much information. This is one of those kinds of books/workbooks that is more like an ongoing activity that can and should be used more than once with all your ideas. If you're looking for an amazing resource and workbook as a writer/fantasy writer I would recommend checking this out. Thanks so much to Goodreads for letting me read and review this fantastic book I received from one of their giveaways. All thoughts and opinions are my own.
December 24, 2024
At first I was confused, because there are terms in the Glossary that aren't in the text, and terms in the text that aren't in the Glossary... And then I was like, you dummy! This is Book TWO in a series about world creation! Okay, okay, time to check out the first book and see if it's as useful as this one turned out to be. Which is plenty. Get this one if you're trying to create a "bible" for your series.
October 1, 2021
This book is really interesting. Since film is classes are my favorite. This book gives you perspective on how to go about doing the worldbuilding in your way at the the same time keeping it together with all elements needed to create it.
October 27, 2021
This one is just a rehash of the first book.
While the author acknowledges there is not a need for the second book - yet they wrote it - and they simplified what was already stated so ... waste of your time.
While the author acknowledges there is not a need for the second book - yet they wrote it - and they simplified what was already stated so ... waste of your time.
June 16, 2022
Great breakdown of worldbuilding and the steps to get there.
August 1, 2023
Good but not essential follow up
A good book with some excellent prompts for worldbuilding, but too much repetition of content from the first book in the series.
A good book with some excellent prompts for worldbuilding, but too much repetition of content from the first book in the series.
April 10, 2024
Academic but digestible. The author has a passion for world building and it's amazing to engage with this book as part of the creative process. I certainly learned a lot!
Displaying 1 - 8 of 8 reviews