Writing fantasy where magic isn't super relevant to the plot.

[JLiana]

Hello lovely people.

Just wondering what the take is on stories set in a fantasy setting, but lack a lot of the elements that make a story...fantasy. Like magic or dragons. The book I'm writing is more character focused and the obstacles don't include slaying monsters and whatnot (though a monster encounter, minus the slaying, will probably be involved at some point).

How can I signal early on that the setting is fantasy? I don't want readers to be confused, but I'm finding it hard to put in "tells" because they feel out of place with the scenes I'm writing/have written.

 

[RoccO]

There are many fantasy stories that are driven by time-period rather than plot. I can think of a few off the top of my head. They have the fantasy element in them because that is what is familiar, what is relevant. I think high fantasy is the only case where dragons and wizards are required, but there is a hole in the market for tribalism that has never gone astray, and that is what I think you are speaking of here.

Shamanism is one step further, that is the realisation of dreams, and though a fantasy can have illusion, like some others I can think of, it does not make it in the real world. There are however all sorts of fantasy items in a book that would make it fantasy, a bowl of all the changes in setting from the real day world to fantasy. There may be some mishap in the world, that could only be deemed magic, but that is a deviation from what is dramatic or adventurous about our own existence.

There are time travel stories with fantasy ancient kingdoms that are still deemed fantasy, even though all that is different is a name change and a stretch of the imagination. There are some I can think of that have a seperate time from our own, still deemed fantasy, only perhaps because it could not happen in our own time-line.

 

[Karlin]

The question is how to tell your readers what the setting is. You can drop a few details near the begining that will show this. A title page that says" Rwalabraship , year 5723". Or even a map.

 

[pmmg]

I would think a book cover or a blurb could do this before they buy.

Characters need not be in a world with physical monsters to believe they are real. They can certainly talk about things that seem monsterish even if they dont appear. That they might appear would not seem unusual to them, just as I might not expect to see Bigfoot, but if I did, I might know what to call it.

Low fantasy stories do not show or have characters rely on fantasy elements, but they do appear at times. It really does not take much, just a stone the dimly glows for no known reason would indicate something magical may occur.

Even a map with just Unkown, or there be monsters here, would do it.

I think I would just mention the belief and leave it unclear if it they were real or not.

There were tales of Shadows that came to life, but Bob did not know if they were true or not. No one had ever seen such a creature...but as he made his way down the road in the dark wood, long after the sun had fallen, it was hard for him not to believe, did he jump at shadows, or at things imagined? Whatever the answer it gave him chills.

 

[Mad Swede]

If I were you I'd read a few fantasy books which don't have magic or monsters in them. Here are a few examples:

The Lies of Locke Lamora by Scott Lynch
Arlinga: Concerning a man by Roan Clay
The Folding Knife by K J Parker
The Black Hawks by David Wragg
Red Country by Joe Abercrombie
The Lions of Al-Rassan by Guy Gavriel Kay
Ella Enchanted by Gail Carson Levine
Exit West by Mohsin Hamid

 

[Prince of Spires]

Even Game of Thrones (the novel, not the whole series) is very low on magic. And it's a good portrayal of how you can do it. Going from memory, there are about 4 fantasy elements in the novel, which paint it as fantasy.

In the prologue, there are the others who kill a couple of watchmen. You have Ned Stark with a huge, mythical sword executing one of those fleeing watchmen. There is the Wall in the North (and those mysterious trees). And Dynaris gets given dragon eggs as a wedding gift. That's pretty much it for the first songs of ice and fire books.

Any magic that happens, happens off screen and is doubted by the main characters. The gods don't do anything. It's just an alternative medieval world.

Do the same. Just paint your setting. And if there is magic in your world, then just have a character reference it. Or mention they don't believe in that stuff. Have it happen off screen somewhere. The rest is just standard foreshadowing etc. Don't have things appear out of nowhere at the end of the book if they are crucial to the plot.

 

[Gurkhal]

I just want to say that low fantasy with as little magic as possible the fantasy I enjoy the most and I hope that the OP posts some stories for us to read on this site.

 

[skip.knox]

I have to ask: why do you think you have a fantasy novel? No magic, no monsters ...?

There is an older genre of "fantastic" stories in which extraordinary things happen, often crossing over into horror or at least dread. If the setting and people are all entirely ordinary, then where's the fantasy element?

 

[Penpilot]

Would something like Conan the Barbarian fall into this category?

In terms of how you can signal to the reader that this is fantasy, just add an element that's fantastical in some way, but isn't magical. It can be someone telling the myth of how the world was formed. It can be the existence of fantastical sounding places, people, objects and/or animals. If someone said they ran into an owl-bear the other day, that signals pretty hard that we're not on Earth.

 

[JLiana]

I have to ask: why do you think you have a fantasy novel? No magic, no monsters ...?

There is an older genre of "fantastic" stories in which extraordinary things happen, often crossing over into horror or at least dread. If the setting and people are all entirely ordinary, then where's the fantasy element?

Oh, there's monsters, magic, etc, it's just they're not exactly super important to the overall story. I saw a critique elsewhere that said signalling genre is important early on, so I was curious what other people thought.

 

[xena]

Hello lovely people.

Just wondering what the take is on stories set in a fantasy setting, but lack a lot of the elements that make a story...fantasy. Like magic or dragons. The book I'm writing is more character focused and the obstacles don't include slaying monsters and whatnot (though a monster encounter, minus the slaying, will probably be involved at some point).

How can I signal early on that the setting is fantasy? I don't want readers to be confused, but I'm finding it hard to put in "tells" because they feel out of place with the scenes I'm writing/have written.

I think it can absolutely work! You don’t need magic or dragons, small details like how people interact with the world can signal it naturally.

 

[skip.knox]

OK, so it's a fantasy setting, but ... we don't know it? Ordinary setting (for whatever time period; you didn't specify). Normally, we get Ordinary for a chapter or two, sometimes with hints dropped and sometimes not, but then we step through the wardrobe or fall down the hole and then we are most definitely, emphatically in a fantasy setting. The book cover and blurb establish the genre; they make the promise, so we're willing to go along for a chapter or two to get to the payoff.

The front matter still needs to establish genre. The opening chapters are ordinary. What comes later has none, either? After a while, the reader is going to start suspecting they've been duped.

I have a book that opens in the ordinary. The front matter definitely promises fantasy. The opening chapters don't have anything magical happen, but the characters introduced include an ogre and an elf, so the genre gets established. The magical events in the story are few, but they are central.

It's difficult to say how I feel about what's asked in the subject line, beyond the usual formula: if it's done well, I like it; if not, then not.