Tell & Drop: Worldbuilding As You Go
Riley Devine
So here’s our big question: How do I tell my readers about this amazing world I’ve created? There are a few ways to go about it. For the beginner author, it often turns into a massive info dump—every tiny detail about the city of Wherever and the king of Certainly-a-Kingdomia crammed into Chapter One. But trust me, that’s not the way to do it. A better approach? Take a cue from George R. R. Martin. Throw in a name here, a place there—don’t explain it, don’t revisit it—just let it hang in the breeze until you can actually give us the nitty-gritty details at a later point.
The “tell and drop” method is exactly that: introduce a detail and move on without lingering. The key is not to bog down the narrative with long explanations. The best way to do it is to start slinging names and places at your reader wherever they fit—through thoughts, dialogue, or even setting descriptions. At first, these names might seem like throwaway details and might even be forgotten, but as the story unfolds, you’ll realize they are important parts of a much larger world. You might remember Sir Who’s-It-of-Who-Cares a few chapters later, and by then, you already feel familiar with somebody you know nothing about. It makes the world feel real, like a friend mentioning someone you don’t meet until weeks later.
Now, of course, you wonder why it works. First, it keeps the pace of the story moving. Instead of getting stuck in long-winded trauma dumps of exposition, you give your readers just enough to spark curiosity and run off before they can satisfy that spark. It builds intrigue and keeps them engaged, always wondering when or if that name or place will become significant. This doesn’t even touch on how it mirrors real life—most things we encounter don’t come with explanations attached. We accept the details as they come, and they gain meaning over time as you further explore them.
So, how can you use this method in your writing? Just start with casually mentioning places, characters, events, whatever you need really. You don’t need to give the full backstory at the moment, just drop the details and keep going. Maybe a character mentions a neighboring kingdom in passing, or an old legend, or some rival they’ve been beefing with for decades, it’s not particularly limited to any specific topic. These brief moments give the world depth without overwhelming the reader with information they don’t need yet.
By trusting the reader to pick up on these little details, you keep the world-building subtle but effective, and it makes the world feel lived in and real—constantly evolving and expanding. So, instead of explaining every nook and cranny of your world in a potentially boring lecture mid-scene, let the details breathe and emerge naturally across chapters and chapters of fine work.
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