The Totally Not Sarcastic Guide to Writing Fantasy Novels

There’s lots of fantasy out there, so why not add your own novel to the pile? Fantasy has already claimed the lives of millions of trees, why not a few hundred more? But you have to make sure that your fantasy is truly genre-true before you send it out. This handy guide will make sure that any trace of originality, logic, or rational thought is gone from your novel.

The Plot:

First, start off by choosing one of three pre-made plots. Make sure that you stay exactly on the formula. Originality is not allowed.

Start with a farmboy living in a remote village describing his surroundings. He must, for whatever reason, believe that his family on the farm is not his real family. Soon, minions of the nondescript Dark Lord come and kill his family and destroy his house, at which point a Mysterious Stranger (either an old hermit or storyteller living in the town or someone following the minions of the Dark Lord) whisks them off to safety. They journey across the land, during which the Mysterious Stranger mentors the farmboy in the ways of the sword and magic. Then the Mysterious Stranger is killed defending the farmboy from the Dark Lord’s minions, but somehow managed to give a long dramatic death speech and impart some vital information to the farmboy. Another character (see “The Characters” below for ideas) joins up with the farmboy. The travel to the underground rebel group, gain great renown within them, and eventually defeat the Dark Lord.

Start with a rebellious princess who insists on being treated like a boy. She will refuse to wear dresses, sew, get married, or do anything remotely feminine. She will eventually run away from the castle, despite knowing nothing about survival in the big wide world and somehow manages to become a fearsome warrioress. Bonus points if she runs away to escape an arranged marriage.

An adventuring party of 3-8 sets off on a quest to find some magic artifact (which is either hidden in a remote locale or split into multiple pieces). The characters must fall into one or more of the following categories, all of which must be used:

• The hero.
• The love interest.
• The wise old mentor.
• The grizzled veteran.
• The cowardly rogue.
• The elf.
• The dwarf.
• The useless comic relief.

After the find the object, they use it to defeat some kind of villain. But don’t use your imagination, use a villain from the following section.

There are also some scenes that should happen at some point in the novel, regardless of which plot you use.

• The main character discovers that he or she is the subject of an ancient prophecy and that only they can save the world/find an object/do whatever. This definitely should be considered. Even if the prophecy was first said in an older language, it must rhyme in English.
• The characters should visit a tavern, resulting in either a drunken bar fight or the tavern being set on fire. In the case of the latter, one of the female characters should, upon getting out, realize that she left some trinket or item of jewelry inside and rush back in.
• The characters should be attacked by wolves while traveling through a forest.
• The characters should take a shortcut through ancient dwarven mines.
• The characters should find some magical weapon or item, but are told to never ever use it.
• The characters should have to obtain some item that is guarded by a fearsome dragon or other monster. Bonus points if they end up befriending the monster.
• The hero discovers that the villain is his father and angsts about for the rest of the book. Thoughts of reconciliation are forbidden.

The Characters:

Make sure that the hero and villain conform to these standards.

The hero must start off incredibly sheltered, but somehow knowledgeable about the entire land and everything in it, except for things that his knowledge of would reduce plot tension. He must start off not knowing the slightest thing about weapon use or casting spells (he may not even know he has magic at the beginning), but be able to learn them in a matter of weeks, surpassing in skill those who have trained their whole lives. Rules of magic will be broken for the hero. Bonus points if they’re illiterate and have to learn to read. More bonus points if they end up needing to learn a second language. If the hero is female, she must be a tomboy who whines a lot and insists she can do anything that a man can (but in reality, can't), except when she sees the male lead without his shirt on, at which point she must act like a spineless doormat. No exceptions. No matter what the hero does, he must always he hailed as a righteous savior of the people. Anyone who dislikes the hero must be at least one of the following: stupid, jealous, a villain, or dead by the end of the story.

The villain must be one of two possible types. Either he is an evil king who usurped power and now rules with an iron fist and is hated by everyone and yet still manages to command immense armies and not get revolted out of power by the people, or he is an all-powerful evil sorcerer or monster who subjugates the land. The villain must be completely evil. Not even a shred of goodness is permitted. His hobbies should include torturing or disemboweling children and/or small and cute animals. He also must be either completely hideous or “darkly” or “coldly” handsome or beautiful. Bonus points if his presence in the land causes crop failure, animal infertility, and birth defects. The villain must also always be referred to as the “Dark Lord”. He must also wear black all the time, even if it’s sunny out. If the villain is an attractive female, she must attempt to seduce the hero (if the hero is male) at one or more points in the story. No exceptions.

Other protagonists should include:

• The grizzled veteran. Typically he will have served in the army for a long time (20+ years), but he will never have been promoted. He will sit around the campfire saying nothing. Bonus points if he has a scar running down his face.
• The cowardly rogue. This character will be a homeless street thief or burglar that the hero befriends while visiting a city. He will speak with a Cockney accent and have great respect for the hero, even if he acts like a jerk to him. This character may or may not fill the role of comic relief.
• The wise old mentor. This character, despite being incredibly old, must be remarkably spry and have a full head of hair and a beard. He will teach the hero about weapon use and magic use. This character must be dead by the end of the story.
• The designated love interest. Despite having had little to no access to soap or bathing, she must have flawless skin and perfect hair. She must either be a hometown friend of the hero or someone he meets along the way (preferably a princess in disguise). She must be complete doormat, even if she fights. At one point in the story, she will have to be kidnapped and the hero will have to rescue her. If you read a description of your designated love interest to a group of feminists and they attempt to murder you, you're good to go!
• The bumbling mage. This character, despite being clumsy, forgetful, and danger-prone, was for some reason taught magic. His spells should fail unless the hero needs them to succeed.
• The comic relief. The comic relief may be combined with any other character. If standing alone, he must be a bard with absolutely no talent.
• The arrogant royal. Usually male. Must be stuffy, condescending, and constantly walking like there’s a stick shoved up his butt.
• The telepathic companion. Must be a cat (domestic or wild), wolf, bird of prey, songbird, monkey, ferret, or horse. Animals that aren’t pretty or majestic must be avoided at all costs, unless they’re evil. The animal must talk like this into the hero’s head and have no personality. They must abandon all animal traits and instincts and act like a human in a suit.
• The bad boy anti-hero. Will be on the side of good, but dress in dark clothing and brood over everything. This character may or may not be related to the hero, the villain, or both. This character should be introduced by swooping in to save the day.

Other antagonists should include:

• The handsome/beautiful son/daughter of the villain. If these characters exist, they must fall in love with the hero (unless the villain is the hero’s father as well, because then that would be gross).
• The hideous, stupid monster sidekick of the Dark Lord. It should be present if the Dark Lord has armies of Orcs/demons/goblins/other stereotypical evil races.
• The clergy figure (bishop, priest, etc.) who appears to be good at first, but is actually on the side of evil. Must be male. Must be either short and fat or tall and skinny. Must wear flowing robes, gaudy jewels, and be really old.
• The evil merchant. Must be extremely fat and greedy. He must either steal something from one of the good characters or turn them in to the Dark Lord for money.
• The bandit leader. This character will not be associated with the Dark Lord, but will instead be on his own side, leading a group of bandits. If this character exists, he must kidnap the designated love interest. No exceptions. Do not attempt to make the bandit leader and the grizzled veteran related in some way, because that would be, you know, original.
• The assassin hired by the Dark Lord to kill the hero. Must either stalk or infiltrate the hero’s adventuring party. In the case of the latter, the hero or designated love interest must be somehow able to tell that he is evil.
• The designated bully. Typically from the hero's hometown, he (or she) will harass and antagonize the hero before he leaves on his epic quest, but will be awestruck at the hero's newfound power when he returns.

Make sure that the characters have no personality beyond their one defining trait (cowardice, evil, goodness, courage, etc.). The hero and designated love interest must also be completely and utterly perfect. No flaws, physical, mental, or moral. They should instantly succeed at everything they do.

Romances between characters must be substantiated by “true love” or “love at first sight”, especially if the characters have no chemistry whatsoever.

Also, certain characters must talk using words like ye, me, thine, thou, and dost. You must never explain why some characters do and others don't.

The Setting:

Your setting must be based off of medieval Europe, but you can’t actually research medieval Europe. Just go with what you’ve learned from movies and other crap fantasy novels. In case you haven’t paid attention, here are a few key details and settings that your novel will likely include.

When designing the world, forget everything you know about geography and basic logic. If you think it would be cool to have a glacier border a bayou, go ahead and do it.

On second thought, don’t have glaciers or bayous. The only biomes you can have are mountains, fields, forests, and freshwater lakes and rivers. Mountains should be bare shards of black rock that jut from the ground in random places, preferably not part of a range. If you must use a mountain range, the mountains must run in parallel rows and columns. Fields should be like lawns, perfectly green and well-manicured. Forests should either be light and pretty or dark, evil, and full of wolves. Rivers should start and end at random places, and there should be at least one river that flows uphill or doubles back on itself. Lakes cannot have marshy shores or islands. Oxbow lakes are utterly forbidden.

The culture of your world must be as follows: the rich treat the poor like crap, men treat women like crap.

You have to be very careful to avoid mention of any masons, carpenters, glassblowers, seamstresses, or other middle-class craftsmen. Blacksmiths are the sole exception, as someone needs to forge the hero's uber-special weapon (even if all he has previously forged are rough farm implements). The only farms you mention must be subsistence farms.

Here are some nice made-to-order settings for your fantasy novel.

The Backwater Village. Must be in the butt-end of nowhere. Will be a small collection of houses. Unless the hero is royalty, he or she must be from a backwater village. No exceptions.

The City. The city will always have filthy cobblestone streets that somehow manage to accommodate shod hooves. The street layout will be reminiscent of something a person might draw while high on acid, and the only people that will truly know how to navigate will be thieves. No matter where it is located, it must always have a tall, thick stone wall. Also remember that putting cities near rivers or lakes is a sign of logic and rational thought, so avoid that. Seaport cities must be run by pirates.

The Dungeon. Will always be run by the Dark Lord, because the good guys are too good to imprison their enemies. Must be filthy and full of rats and mold. The guards will always be overweight and have five o’clock shadow, and their food shouldn’t be much better than the stuff that the prisoners get.

The Fantasy Elements:

Fantasy elements (magic, races, etc.) are a difficult part of fantasy. You have to be careful that you don’t make anything original or consistent.

Magic in your world should be weak and/or hard to control, except for the hero, who must attain godlike powers within a year. Hand gestures and words are a must. No matter how dangerous, powerful, or unstable magic is, anyone who hates or fears it must be portrayed as an ignorant bigot.

You must include fantasy races (and you are forbidden to refer them as "species"). Elves, dwarves, dragons, and a designated evil race (orcs, ogres, trolls, dark elves, or goblins) are must-haves. Elves must be tall, thin, long-lived, and way stronger and faster than humans. They also must live in forests and act like hippies/eco-terrorists. Dwarves must be short, stocky, bearded, and live in caves and mine stuff. They also have to regularly use the words “mine”, “axe”, “stone”, “clan”, and “honor”. Dragons must be based off of Western European dragons. Chinese dragons, Mesoamerican dragons, Norse dragons, or Greek dragons are forbidden. They must spend their time hoarding treasure, kidnapping maidens, and razing villages, or alternately, letting humans ride them.

Other options for races include centaurs, fairies, sprites, gnomes, walking trees, pegasi, unicorns, griffins, angels, demons, gargoyles, vampires, werewolves, merpeople, satyrs/fauns, giant spiders, krakens/sea serpents, basilisks, phoenixes, and wyverns. See how they are normally done and STICK TO THAT.

All members of any one race (except humans) should all have pretty much the same personality. A race must either be completely good or completely evil.

To make the names of people and places seem more authentic, each should be at least three syllables long and contain one or more of the following; accent márks, umläuts, apo'strophes, hyph-ens, or øthœr çoõl åñd ëxôtîc šýmbôls, regardless of what they actually mean. Consistency with spelling, name structure, and pronunciation within the names of people from a particular village or area is forbidden.

The hero must name his weapon, and then refuse to fight with any other should he lose it, which should happen at least once to create tension.

The Writing:

The writing is one of the easiest parts to mess up. Here are some tips to banish all those nasty things like sense.

1. Describe everything. Every detail of the surroundings should get at least one paragraph describing it, even things that are completely inconsequential to the plot. This goes double for during action scenes. Bonus crap points can be earned by describing things that everyone already knows the traits of (the sky is blue, water is wet, fire is hot, etc.) and/or by using a thesaurus on every adjective. Using “bright” may be concise and easy to understand, but using words like “effulgent” and “scintillating” will make you and your work seem smarter and more sophisticated. Every noun should have at least two adjectives attached to it.

2. Whenever you introduce a character, make sure to explain his or her entire backstory, personality, appearance, and future role in the story.

3. At least 20% of the text in the novel should be dedicated to explaining things (history or mythology of your world, how things work, etc.) to the reader.

4. When using a simile or metaphor, you have to use the first thing that pops into your head. Bonus points if that first thing makes absolutely no sense or is completely redundant.

5. Every character should be completely described, using poetic terms, at least four times in the novel.

Other:

Here are some final things to do to give your fantasy novel an extra push.

1. Make the horses (any other mounts besides dragons would be original, and you can’t have that) act not like horses, but like furry cars with four legs. They should be able to go full gallop for several days straight, never have to eat (and when they do they can just graze) or sleep, and never rebel or disobey the owner, even if the owner has only just bought them.

2. If you include an evil race (Orcs, goblins, demons) in your novel, their skin should be black, brown, or dark green, to remind everyone that dark-skinned people are evil to make them gross and intimidating.

Disclaimer: This is all horrible advice. If you think that any of this is good advice, you do not understand fantasy. Or sarcasm.