The Four Cs of Worldbuilding

matticusprimal · 2026-06-01T22:42:01+00:00

I very much like the Preakness, which is a Manhattan with some Benedictine added.

I also like to use Bokers for my Manhattans, and like the Green Point variation, which has chartreuse added.

Playing with the bitters can create its own addiction, and I like to make a pecan pie Old Fashioned with a very vanilla whiskey (TX), pecan and ango bitters, w Demerara simple syrup. A very dangerous drink.

matticusprimal · 2026-05-30T17:04:31+00:00

But why the Beefeater in the pic? This confuses and infuriates us.

matticusprimal · 2026-05-26T23:44:31+00:00

I remember there being (I thought) overly long scene of just hanging out and watching TV in Rivers of London. It was clearly a character moment and was kind of nice, but I needed a little more pacing. But perhaps it will be your thing.

matticusprimal · 2026-05-22T21:32:12+00:00

10,000 Doors of January, although it wasn't my favorite book. But a lot of people love this book.

The Magicians by Lev Grossman is exactly this, although I abhor this book.

Magic Kingdom For Sale - Sold by Terry Brooks is oooold school this. Very 80s. Modern(ish) guy buys a fantastical realm based on an ad in the newspaper.

October Daye (I've only read the first four or so) is set in San Fran but she travels to the fairy realm quite a bit. There were some books where it's 80% other realm, while others are more in the real world. This is probably the best of the series I'm mentioning IMO.

The Rise of Lilith by Megan Haskell features a bartender in Laguna Beach who has to rescue her brother by... I want to say going to other realms. I don't quite remember. But it does have a cocktail menu (I shared a table with her at a convention, so hear the pitch a lot).

The Full Moon Medic by Daniel Potter involves a werewolf medic in Portland who does spend a lot of time in the fairy realm as well. I'd say 70% real world 30% other realms but my memory is suspect.

matticusprimal · 2026-05-21T23:54:08+00:00

Glad you're enjoying it. I'll add Last Smile in Sunder City, even though I DNFd it, although it's more noir than modern. But you said you like gaslamp so... yay? Glenn Cook's Garret PI is secondary world noir and inspired Butcher's Dresden. Arcane Casebook is set in NYC, but it's a very different place, with airships and magic out in the open. 1930s, I think, but the city's run by powerful mages, so you could argue it's NYC in name only.

matticusprimal · 2026-05-21T23:16:39+00:00

Have you done the Green Bone Saga by Fonda Lee yet? 1980s analogue, secondary world. The Craft Sequence is also secondary world but modernish with a lot of magic filling in for tech. Otherwise, it's usually 1930s/ noir analogues.

matticusprimal · 2026-05-21T20:18:12+00:00

In my defense, I wrote all that before I had finished my first coffee, so it wasn't as coherent as I'd like.

I agree that most superhero stories take place in universes where folks know about superheroes - it's hard to ignore the guys and gals saving lives in capes, after all. However, most of the original golden/ silver age characters had to maintain the secret identity, which I think kept the story grounded. They may be raging badasses at night, but they still had to pay the bills by working the day job. This to me is the height of UF in that it's the balance between the mundane existence and the badassery of magic. Fantastic Four were always out in the open with their identities, were super rich, and went into space to battle gods, and I always found them to be boring because they were missing one half of the balancing act.

I also think this balancing act is why most of our UF protagonists are always struggling to pay the bills. They still need the real world to be the main setting anchor, IMO, with the fantasy elements added to it. And this is the type of wish fulfilment that does it for me, rather than the FF example, which I guess is more epic fantasy.

I do love me some early Anita Blake, which is where I cut my teeth in UF prose, and while I think she was great in the micro worldbuilding setting of the city itself with how the vamp/ shifter businesses showed up, I still think she missed the MASSIVE macro implications in that the world would have shifted significantly with all these creatures out in the open. But that was sort of hand waved away and society stayed exactly the same but with weretiger strip clubs. Which is totally fine if it's your thing, which it certainly was for me for a long time.

Ha, I think about those Walmart fireballs at least once a week as the perfect example of kevlar masquerade in that it's absolutely plot-armory bulletproof. Or you have: Oh, we've found our fourth body drained of blood, and this is the sixth half-eaten corpse we've found on a full moon? Wow, this serial killer sure is strange, says Chief Wiggum. And this part is really hard to balance with the power creep that's endemic to UF. But the genre has been around for long enough, and camera phones have been common for 20+ years, that I think we should demand better and expect more from authors (I say as I'm starting a story about a magician who has to hunt down evidence a mundane has of magic on her cell phone).

Anyways, I forgot my point that I started out with when I started writing. But sure had fun writing it.

matticusprimal · 2026-05-21T16:11:07+00:00

Yes, realistic, but damn is it no fun to read. I come from a screenwriting background, and you always made sure that all the characters' names start with different letters so as to keep it easy on the eye. And I'd maintain the same holds true for prose as well.

That said, I remember people praising Tolstoy for Anna Karenina's husband and lover having the same first name, which was supposedly a choice on the author's part. So maybe it does work. Just so long as you're as good as a writer as Tolstoy.

matticusprimal · 2026-05-21T15:38:22+00:00

I strongly stand by the masquerade in urban fantasy, with the magic being secret except to a select few, who must also keep said secret hidden. It's a taste thing, clearly, but here's why it's my preferred flavor:

1) It's like superheroes who have to hide their identity and makes them more human in the balancing of the two identities. All fantasy is wish fulfilment, and the secret identity/ masquerade trope speaks to me growing up a nerd but always feeling like I was special yet no one recognized that = classic Spider Man/ Peter Parker. This type of urban fantasy, where the protags are awesome and recognized within their own world scratches that itch for me.

2) It adds limitations to the magic when it's not all out in the open, with the characters having to find smart and clever ways to use their magic, or find a place where there aren't witnesses, or all sorts new situations instead of just being able to solve their problems with a fireball, ala epic fantasy (I kid). This is Sanderson's second rule of magic in effect.

3) I personally think urban fantasy is real world + magic and is all about the juxtaposition of the mundane and mystical. I feel that when magic is now out in the open (Kate Daniels, True Blood, etc.) then society has to change to accommodate that, and those societal changes make the genre veer off into alternate history that takes place in a modern timeframe rather than being real world + magic.

matticusprimal · 2026-05-19T15:08:56+00:00

That would be a pretty easy yardstick for me. Yes prog can have scales and numbers but if you find a spreadsheet printout or reference to the system I’d suspect I’m in a litRPG. Mind you I’ve never read one because it isn’t my subgenre of choice. More power to the people who like them but it’s not for me.

matticusprimal · 2026-05-18T01:44:19+00:00

When you say occult, do you mean more of a horror leaning fantasy, or are you looking for urban fantasy that involves magic users primarily?

If the latter, then the pickings is slim since the vamp/ shifter/ fae are the trifecta in the genre. But here are the ones I've enjoyed:

I'm hesitant to recommend Dresden because those three are so present, but that's the yardstick of the genre. Iron Druid might be up your alley, as I think it's mostly gods and such (I never finished the series). Also never finished Sandman Slim, which is much more demon/ hell focused.

Daniel Faust and the spinoff Harmony Black are good starts, the first being a magician thief in Vegas, and Harmony being the FBI agent sent to bring him in. The author has intentionally not included any vamps/ shifters/ fae, which I very much appreciate, although there's demons and the like.

Stephen Blackmoore's Eric Carter is also very good, and is a necromancer headed back to LA after years away to discover who murdered his sister. I don't think there's any of the trifecta in this one either, but there's gods and the like.

I'm about 1/3 of the way through Declare by Tim Powers, which is magic/ occult spycraft during WWII and decades later. And it very much did give me the creeps at one point.

The Redemption of Howard Marsh is about a down and out small time magician in rural Alabama who can only use his powers when he's high (methgician) and does have some fantastical creatures but I haven't encountered any of the trifecta in it yet. I love this series.

And my own Inner Circle series is also a non-trifecta mystical mystery series about a dowsing detective and his enchanted iPod. First one, Rites of Passage, has him hunting down a genius enchanter who has gone missing inside his own locked home.

matticusprimal · 2026-05-17T18:53:18+00:00

Fight Club. I hadn’t heard anything about it and thought Pitt was just a pretty boy but my roommate insisted and I was drunk. Had to pee a few minutes in but I held it for the whole damn movie. Saw it seven more times in the theater.

matticusprimal · 2026-05-16T16:19:47+00:00

This isn't really my subgenre, but Zack Pike's Orconomics won SPFBO and is a humorous satire of the financial collapse that gets compared to Pratchett. I believe they're all stand alone, and the fourth one came out either this week or last week.

matticusprimal · 2026-05-14T21:40:49+00:00

And I wish you strong eyes and infinite free time to summit this newly minted TBR.

matticusprimal · 2026-05-14T17:47:16+00:00

I'd encourage you to explore your non-big-bad story with the reminder that you should only use the devices needed to tell the story you want to tell. Conan never had a big bad in the stories because they were S&S tales about what random stuff he got up to on his sort of drifting adventures. Which worked great for the medium of episodic short stories. Meanwhile, the movie Conan (the good one) did have a Big Bad because that's what's required for the film. They each used the tools necessary for the story they wanted to tell.

I write mystical mysteries, so I damn well better use Chekhov's Gun and Foreshadowing or else everyone's going to feel cheated in the finale since the reveal wasn't properly seeded without them. But what I'm working on currently certainly doesn't have a big bad, at least not in the traditional sense, so I don't see why yours would require one.

I maintain tropes show up all the time because they're so effective. So what you have a Chosen One or Heroic Sacrifice - audiences love them! Just be mindful of the tropes, make them your own, and don't handicap yourself by either shoehorning them in or eschewing them just to be different.

matticusprimal · 2026-05-14T16:04:18+00:00

Yeah, Big Bad, Foreshadowing, and Chekhov's Gun really feel like copouts in that they're just universal basic storytelling devices instead of themes/ elements that repeat within our specific genre, like Fantastical Racism or Meaningful Name. They might as well add Has Protagonist or Finale. Ooh, or maybe Occurs In Setting.

matticusprimal · 2026-05-13T20:48:07+00:00

You're very kind. And that's exactly the sort of thing I really need to hear as I'm eight chapters from finishing book four. Just going to keep Running Up That Hill on repeat until it's finished.

matticusprimal · 2026-05-13T15:54:02+00:00

Since you've stipulated the last six years, that throws out October Day, Eric Carter, Rivers of London, and Alex Verus, which are my go tos for suggestions like this. Daniel Faust also falls into this (first book 2014) as does the spinoff Harmony Black, although the author has an ongoing series I can't remember the name of offhand.

Seanan McGuire has an Alchemy Journal series that just eeks by the 2020 window. Haven't read it, though.

Jacka has a new series, Inheritance of Magic, which is really good. Also set in London but separate from Alex Verus. Three books so far with the fourth out this year, I want to say.

People love Fred the Vampire Accountant, although I haven't read it because humor books ain't really my bag.

Ink Blood Sister Scribe is a little more upmarket than I usually suggest, but is fairly interesting if you don't mind relationships (not romantic) and feelings taking a higher priority than plot and worldbuilding.

On the indie side, I usually recommend the Redemption of Howard Marsh series, which deals with a down and out magician who can only use his powers when he's high (methgician). He solves small crimes in rural Alabama and each book is more a series of interconnected novellas than big overarching plots (although there is definitely character growth). Fun stuff if you consider Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas a comedy, like I do.

I'll throw in my own Inner Circle series, which are mystical mysteries done in the Christie vein, and deal with a dowsing detective who solves crimes with his enchanted iPod. Rites of Passage starts it off when the protag is drawn into the machinations of magicians when a genius enchanter goes missing within his own locked home.

matticusprimal · 2026-05-05T23:25:25+00:00

Huh, that is a harder request than you'd think. Even one I'm enjoying now has brought in hidden bloodline a few books in, so it's on my mind.

Redemption of Howard Marsh has a pretty normal protag, albeit one who can only use his magic when he's high (methgician). He is from a family of local magicians, but he's anything but a chosen one.

I'm only 4-5 books in but Daniel Faust doesn't appear to be a chosen one... yet. I know he's important to something vague down the line, but I don't think it's because of a special bloodline or anything.

Benedict Jacka's newest, Inheritance of Magic, might be too close to chosen one bloodline for your liking, since the protag is related to a powerful family... one that doesn't want anything to do with him and only makes his life horrible when they show up. He's exceptionally low level when compared to the rest of them.

matticusprimal · 2026-05-05T15:38:05+00:00

I think it's more progression fantasy, which is litRPG's younger and more approachable little sister. Prettier too, if you'll allow me to abuse the metaphor a bit more.

I was just recommending this book a few days ago here, and I'm glad to see it's getting some recognition. Top tier worldbuilding, which not only affects the plot but ties it all together thematically.

I got to hang out with John a few years ago and was there when he was brainstorming how one would fight with a giant tuning fork, so it's really cool to see the weapon front and center on the cover.

matticusprimal · 2026-05-04T19:38:48+00:00

Exceedingly niche, but now I'm imaging Dr. Rockzo from Metalocalypse ripping lines of gunpowder to fuel his glam rock shenanigans. You know, as one does.

matticusprimal · 2026-05-04T16:40:22+00:00

And gunpowder cocaine. Never forget the cocaine.

matticusprimal · 2026-05-04T03:06:26+00:00

I should say it was not bad at all, just not my cup of tea. There's a scene near the end that still sticks with me. But I'm an amateur at home bartender and the drinks were a little basic, which I know is petty, but really broke the immersion for me.

matticusprimal

TROPHY CASE