Episode
Episode 161: The On Ramp
- Podcast
- Worldbuilding for Masochists
- Published
- Aug 13, 2025
- Duration seconds
- 3666
- Processing state
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Summary
In this episode, we're taking a closer look at something we refer to a lot when we're talking craft: the on-ramp. Which is to say, at the beginning of your book, as you're introducing your world, how much stuff can you throw at your reader how quickly to get them up to speed? And how much is too much and might cause a reader to get bounced right out of the story? Your readers come in with a lot of assumptions and expectations. Your job as the writer is to adjust those expectations, particularly with your ideal reader in mind. Sometimes, that means choosing which battles you're going to fight when it comes to how much worldbuilding you actually include on the page and how you introduce vocabulary and concepts. [Transcript for Episode 161 -- Thank you, scribes!]