Creating multiple novel races in one story: Good or bad?

Dagrami · Jan 28, 2012

For a while now, I've been contemplating about tackling a truly epic epic fantasy series (or at least attempting to!). For some reason, I love the idea of juggling endless plots, characters and cultures, carefully constructing them into a cohesive story.

I already have a plot a-brewing in my mind, but my problem is this: it involves four or five anthropomorphic races of my own creation. And this got me thinking. Is this too many? Will readers forever be confused as to which species each character belongs? I was thinking of having at least one PoV character from each race, so readers would have a foundation in each of them.

It's not that I'm using different races when different human groups would suffice instead. They really are very different from each other in regards to culture, politics and especially biology. Without them being different races, the story wouldn't work at all.

I know in films and RPGs multiple races are a common element (eg Star Wars, Warcraft, Mass Effect etc). However, these mediums can use visual effects to instantly notify a consumer of differences in appearance and culture. Is it realistically possible to pull something off to this scale in a series of books? I don't want the story to turn into a list of massive info-dumps.

Any advice on the matter? Use less races? Introduce each periodically throughout the story so the reader doesn't get swamped? Or perhaps just don't do it?

Also, if anyone can give some examples of current books out there that do this, it'd be much appreciated!

Thanks

Anne Lyle · Jan 28, 2012

I think if it's an epic series, you should be able to get away with multiple non-human species if you make them all distinct from one another.

My advice would be to try and structure the first book so that you introduce the new species one at time. That's the approach I take in books with large casts - have an opening chapter that's just about the hero and his sidekick, then gradually bring in all the other main characters.

I can't think of any examples offhand, but then I don't read much epic fantasy...

Lhipenwhe · Jan 28, 2012

The biggest example of multiple races is Lord of the Rings, but it might be a bad example; Tolkien put an incredible amount of time and energy into developing them. A modern example is John Scalzi and his Old Man's War series; there are multiple races, and he devotes enough time to give us an inkling of their culture. (Granted, there isn't too much interaction between humans and aliens, at least in the first book).

I'm hesitant to bring up the novels based off of D&D; although they have multiple, fleshed out races, many (if not most) of the readers are already have knowledge of the setting. Another franchise with the same problem is the Star Trek line of books; again, most of the readers are going to know the setting.

Hope this was helpful.

RichardGarfinkle · Jan 28, 2012

I did something similar in an SF novel and it can be tricky.

One good way to start with this kind of thing is to start not with the new races but with how more standard races (humans for example) think about these others. These need not be accurate ideas (indeed they can be misleading stereotypes) but they give the reader a starting point waiting to be disabused by actual interaction with your new inventions.

Arcadia Divine · Jan 28, 2012

Does your world need those races? If it does, then by all means create away.

Personally, I like it when people make an original race. If you want a how to on making a race, I really can't help you there. I can give you some advice but not much else.

My advice to you is to study mythology, books you admire, and human culture. Learn everything you can about those and go from there. When you make your race, don't stereotype. Try to turn the defining features of that race on it's head and go from there. For example, you can have a race of anthropomorphic frogs that are mountainous and not aquatic. Experiment.

Dagrami · Jan 28, 2012

Thanks for the input, everyone. I'm glad no one seems too opposed to the idea!

Lhipenwhe said:
The biggest example of multiple races is Lord of the Rings, but it might be a bad example; Tolkien put an incredible amount of time and energy into developing them. A modern example is John Scalzi and his Old Man's War series; there are multiple races, and he devotes enough time to give us an inkling of their culture. (Granted, there isn't too much interaction between humans and aliens, at least in the first book).

I'm hesitant to bring up the novels based off of D&D; although they have multiple, fleshed out races, many (if not most) of the readers are already have knowledge of the setting. Another franchise with the same problem is the Star Trek line of books; again, most of the readers are going to know the setting.

I'd thought of LotR, too... I can't help but think that that is also slightly affected with the same problems you mentioned for D&D etc - everybody goes into them having an idea what elves and dwarves are like, etc.

And thanks for the suggestion! I'll be sure to add it to my (ever-growing) to-read list.

RichardGarfinkle said:
One good way to start with this kind of thing is to start not with the new races but with how more standard races (humans for example) think about these others. These need not be accurate ideas (indeed they can be misleading stereotypes) but they give the reader a starting point waiting to be disabused by actual interaction with your new inventions.

Yes! I was thinking of doing something along those lines, now I'll be sure to.

Arcadia Divine said:
When you make your race, don't stereotype. Try to turn the defining features of that race on it's head and go from there. For example, you can have a race of anthropomorphic frogs that are mountainous and not aquatic. Experiment.

I'll be sure to not use sterotypes. I've already got many of the features for the races down, and I'm being careful to avoid cliches. I was worried that I might have to use some a bit to help establish the races initially, but good to see others don't think that will necessarily be the case.

Filigree · Jan 28, 2012

Ir's hard work, but it's worth it, Dagrami. Use context to establish details about your race, so human readers can extrapolate their appearance and manner without being subjected to infodumps.

Most of all, have fun with it.

lbender · Jan 28, 2012

1) David Weber - the War God series, starting with Oath of Swords, created a number of different species.

2) Elizabeth Haydon - Symphony of Ages series, starting with Rhapsody. Totally new world, number of new species.

Just the first two I can think of.

Filigree · Jan 28, 2012

In both science fiction and fantasy genres, C.J. Cherryh makes some great non-human races.

Dagrami · Jan 28, 2012

Thanks, Filigree and Ibender - your suggestions have been noted!

Luciamaria · Jan 28, 2012

J.R.R. Tolkien had goblins, hobbits, elves, humans, orcs, Ents... Yeah, I'd say you can use four races.

Ian Isaro · Jan 29, 2012

I'd say a multi-volume series can definitely support multiple races. Echoing the advice above, just be careful how you introduce them.

If the races live relatively separately then your job is easy: just don't throw too many at the reader all at once. If your world is more cosmopolitan, then I think the most important thing is not to force the reader to be familiar with those races too quickly. You can say some guy is a Blubqick and most readers won't blink. Later on you can give more details about the race, but don't force us to pay close attention to Blubqick politics/cultures/genetics/magic from the start.

Two examples that I think show fantasy readers are willing to learn new things if they like your story:
- Steven Erikson has dozens of races and it seems to work for his fans.
- China Mieville throws lots of race names at readers in single novels.

Dagrami · Jan 29, 2012

Ian Isaro said:
I think the most important thing is not to force the reader to be familiar with those races too quickly. You can say some guy is a Blubqick and most readers won't blink. Later on you can give more details about the race, but don't force us to pay close attention to Blubqick politics/cultures/genetics/magic from the start.

Nice advice. I'll have to resist splurging everything about them from the off! Thanks for the book suggestions too!

Creating multiple novel races in one story: Good or bad?

Dagrami

stuck in the middle

Anne Lyle

Fantastic historian

Lhipenwhe

Moving with my soul, step by step

RichardGarfinkle

Nurture Phoenixes

Arcadia Divine

Dagrami

stuck in the middle

Filigree

Mildly Disturbing

lbender

Filigree

Mildly Disturbing

Dagrami

stuck in the middle

Luciamaria

Ian Isaro

New Member

Dagrami

stuck in the middle