How to write Epic Fantasy: A BEGINNER'S GUIDE

This isn’t going to sound too good – Am I the best person to write this guide?

Let’s face it, I’m a ‘pantser’. Someone who writes by ‘the-seat-of-his-pants. I can’t sit down, like normal authors, and plan out the characters, the fantasy ‘world’, the descriptions, the chapters and so on.

Writing epic fantasy begins with imagination, creativity, and the courage to build a world that exists nowhere else.

Start With Imagination, Not Planning.

I work best at sitting, letting an idea come into my head and letting my creative imagination work wonders, and simply allowing them to come through my fingers

and onto the page.

If you are not like that, though, not all is lost by any means; all you need to do is get in touch with yourself as if you were a child.

 Think about it, we are all at our most imaginative and creative as children. I have always believed there are elements of ‘magic’ in all of us at that age, but the realities of life and our material world squashes down all our creative imaginations.

 Think Like A Child Again

So, you want to compose a beautiful, fantastical world, think like a child!  It’s really not that difficult.

Is there a secret to it?

No, of course not. Why? Because I am pretty sure at some time in your life you were a child too, right?

Okay, so call on that muscle memory. Sit somewhere quiet, tell yourself that ANYTHING goes, whatever comes into your head is right.

There is no ‘wrong’ in all this at all. Experiment with your thoughts, think of exciting, adventurous, magical books you read as a child.

Think of just one of those characters, imagine you ARE that character, and you are off in a magical land, swashbuckling and having fun, in colourful worlds where there may be fairies, dragons, and even made-up animals that you have created.

Create a Cinematic Fantasy World

I was on the neck of a blue-scaled dragon the other day, I had the most powerful wand in the cosmos in my hand, and I am flying in and out of white fluffy clouds.

Okay, maybe there is one little secret: instead of that image, imagine you can feel the wind running through your hair, far below, someone has cut their lawn, and smell that grass.

What I am trying to say is bring every possible facet of your imagination, feelings, experiences into this, and a picture, a cinematographic rolling picture emerges.

And don’t forget sounds, the ‘swishing’ of the dragon’s wings, and the developing thunderstorm in the distance, so the low rumbling sounds of thunder.

Let Your Creativity Run Free

With me, my imagination can run away with me, and I love it.

As I am imagining this scene I am asking you to experiment with, I am there, on the Dragon, flying, swooping up, down, all around, in and out of clouds, with a big smile on my face, I am imagining the thrill of it all, and now I’m chuckling, because my imagination is telling me to keep my lips tightly closed.

You know what it’s like with flies sticking to the windscreen of your car on a balmy warm evening, the last thing I want are dead flies sticking to my teeth! Lol

We humans come in all shapes and sizes, with all varying degrees of creativity and imagination. But of one thing I am convinced: we are all creative, but for some of us, we have to coax it out into the open.

And what I have described to you, how to let your mind relax, how to get in touch of your ‘childlike’ you, it will take practice.

It’s not like going to the Gym, the sort of practice I am talking about, is learning to relax and be a ‘child’.

We simply have to encourage your ‘child’ to come and reveal itself.

I will repeat this…nothing you do is wrong.

In the world of imagination and creation, nothing is wrong. It can be serious, humorous, tell a story and even become emotional, and that’s definitely okay.

A Character Example From The Wand Chronicles

Here is a little example of my imagination working on a little image in my mind.

In The Wand Chronicles, I have an Orc. He is big, brutish and ugly, and I wanted a name for him. In my world, Orcs only have one name; they don’t have surnames.

Now I have built him up in my head as I have described the methods I have explained.

He stinks to high heaven (having a shower to an Orc would be torture), he’s dirty, has terrible nails, has pustules constantly erupting on his left shoulder (female Orcs love this about him), and wears tatty clothing.

In this Orc’s case, his mother lived in a dimension which was volcanic, and one day, she let slip the baby Orc into a lava stream, which burnt and disfigured his bottom.

It was at this time that the Mother of the baby Orc was trying to think of a name for him, and as a result of the accident, the name ‘Chard Bhum’ came to her, and it stuck, much to the merriment of his fellow Orcs as he grew up.

Now my imagination didn’t stop there, when Chard Bhum walked, he squeaked, and if there is one thing Orcs despise, it is squeaking!

They would throw things, involuntarily, at anything that squeaked, whether they be double-edged swords, bags of rubbish, wasps’ nests, or even poor unsuspecting cats or dogs!

Chard Bhum went on to be a commander of an Orc battalion. He ended up being covered by scars, not through battles, but from things thrown at him as he walked and consequently ‘squeaked’ his way around.

So, relax, let your creative imagination come to the fore, write a little scene (remember, don’t plan it, let it just happen), have fun, bring in all manner and shapes of creatures into your story, let them run amok, and then pat yourself on the back.

Why?

Because you will have created something from nothing.

You will have started on your epic fantasy writing journey.

And that is magical!

Michael Ross is the author of The Wand Chronicles, an epic high fantasy series blending magic, world-building, and cinematic storytelling.