/lit/ - Literature

>>11303792

Worldbuilding should have something to do with character or theme. In the Coldfire trilogy, the fact that magic responds to human emotion and has limitless possibilities is great because the main character is a wizard priest who has been taught that magic should ultimately be eradicated and that using it for excessive hedonism is the worst thing you can do, and he teams up with the fallen prophet of his religion who sold his soul so that he could become immortal.

Or in A Wizadr of Earthsea, the magic system is a huge part of Ged's character growth at the end.

Either do something like that, or take your science fiction/fantasy elements straight out of real life to make a social commentary, like Orwell did.

Something like The Belgariad, where the fantasy is just there to be fantasy, is what I would call lazy worldbuilding. I actually like The Belgariad, but it's not one of my favorites.

>>4985575

C.S. Friedman is my favorite author for dark fantasy, I recommend the Coldfire and Magister trilogies.

Garth Nix writes pretty dark YA fantasy, especially Shade's Children.