On Tuesday, September 3, 2002, at 03:56 PM, Claire Rojstaczer wrote: > Just a few words from Steve that were in the ConJose restaurant guide > that I thought I'd share with anyone who hadn't seem em. > > ************************************************ > > "In building a fantasy world, I think it's a good idea to start with > the food and work backwards from there. There are a couple of reasons > for this: In the first place, it'll remind you as the author that, > however intricate your world, it is full of people, and people eat. > It will establish a connection to the reader, who almost certainly > eats as well. Second, it's a pretty good method of worldbuilding just > by itself. Here's how it works: You start with a meal. What's for > supper? Maybe some beef? Well, ok. What are they feeding the > cattle. Maize? Fine, then you know this region has a soil reaction > of between pH 5.5 and 8.0, probably a prairie soil or, at any rate, > some well-drained loam soil. You know that this region has at least > 140 frost-free days per year, a mean summer temperature between 21 and > 27 degrees (C), and probably 24-40 inches of rain a year. > > How do you know this? Because you've looked it up in your handy copy > of Principles of Field Crop Production, Third Edition, by Martin, > Leonard, and Stamp, (MacMilliam, 1976). Then you repeat the process > for something else you're eating, maybe rice (I won't go into the > specifics this time), and you can triangulate. Where can both of > these things grow? What conditions does it imply? What sort of world > has a place like that? All sort of fun stuff flows naturally out of > the food. Besides, it will encourage you to write about food; and > that's good, because I like reading about it." > > --Steven Brust > > ************************************************ > ---- Hey! pretty good idea. Of course with Steve, it's always food ;-) Buy my book! http://hompeage.mac.com/zizban