How to Build a World, What Is Info-dumping, and the Dump Puppet Method

Worldbuilding starts as soon as you pick a genre to begin creating your story in.

It’s the time period and the mundane details, your culture and your technology [or lack thereof]. It’s the space where your story happens and It’s going to be defined by your characters and your plot. If your world isn’t solid, then your readers aren’t going to be convinced.

How do you put this information together to make a “world”, without drowning your reader under the dump-truck load of information — info-dumping?

Start Building With a Time Period.

Your time period will be the first checkpoint for any reader entering your world. If it’s in the future, saying ‘this could happen’ is easier because nobody’s been there yet. If it’s in the past, you’re going have a bit more work on your hands.

Don’t let this scare you away though.

Let’s use the Revolutionary War for our example, since I’ve already put some work into developing a story there myself.

We’ll say that you’ve decided you’ll be writing in first person.

You know you’re going to have have three central characters: Henrietta Taylor, her brother Sampson Taylor, and Jeremiah Morgan. The Taylors are Boston Patriots, Jeremiah is a Redcoat.

Now you have to begin planning the plot of the story, based on your chosen characters and time period.

Ask Three Questions.

• What does the average person’s daily routine look like?

• What does my main character do?

• What is disturbed in that routine because of this plot?

When you first meet Henrietta in [Redcoats and Revolution], she is hanging clothes on the laundry line outside. Her brother comes running up with his tricorne askew, waving a newspaper, very insistent that his sister reads it.

Irritated at having her chore disturbed, Henrietta takes the paper to pacify her brother, skims the headline, and promptly flies inside to show her parents the news of British taxation.

So in a very short section of page (it comes to a grand 194 words) I’ve managed to show you the setting, the character’s political convictions, and usual labor.

You just need small details (which are often easiest to show through the routine of life) to give your story a well-grounded setting.

Telling Things Which Can’t Be Shown: AKA The Dumb Puppet Method.

Of course, it’s very hard to show that Sampson is jealous of Jeremiah’s good education and elegant handwriting. He might watch Jeremiah writing a letter and scoff to him about something he said, but Jeremiah might assume Sampson’s just being ill-natured towards him as always.

But if Sampson walks away in sullen silence and Henrietta asks him what he’s mad about “this time,” in his sullen mood, he might admit to her that he wishes he was well-educated like Jeremiah.

Henrietta didn’t know something, so she asked a question. In answering her question, Sampson not only gave information to her, but to your reader as well.

Henrietta asking the same question as your reader served as the conduit for the ‘puppeteer’ [writer] to answer the question by telling, rather than showing.

This is why, in book series like The Boxcar Children, only Jessie and Henry, the oldest of the four, might know something, and Benny and Violet may need it explained.

It makes the series accessible to younger children who might miss the showing, while keeping it amusing to older children, who can relate to answering the ‘why’ and ‘what’ questions of younger children.

You can overdo the Dumb Puppet, though. As a rule, only use it when you can’t find a better way to explain something important. Do not use it as an excuse to have Mr. So-and-so say, “I’m angry at you because you egged my car.” You can show him scowling and shaking his fist at the sky as he goes to fetch the hose and soap and make the egg-throwing culprit wash his car.

Speaking of eggs, I’m hungry.

Have fun, write on, Brooke Johnson out.