Melir - my own world and novel

[Darnoc]

I'm at the moment writing a novel for myself. I've created the world "Melir" for this novel and I'll tell you now something about it, so that you can give me suggestions how to improve it. Also I would like to know if anything inside my own world looks like a copy of Tolkien or any other writer, so that I can change it. My world should be something unique and not just a clone of another world (like Middle Earth). Thanks for your help.

 

 

The Inhabitants of Melir:

 

 

Humans: There are different human nations. In the north and west of Melir live several nations of humans which resembles the western/northern-europe type. The three most important nations are the kingdoms of Lizarke, Vikmaer and Hardwarg. They all speak related languages. They also have cultures resembling the Nors and the german cultures of the middle ages.

In the Southwest lives a different kind of people, the inhabitants of Sargaubon and the desert semi-island are brown-skinned and have black hair. The inhabitants of the desert semi-island Erkat resemble a little the Arabs, the people of Sargaubon resemble the people from Italy and Southern France.

In the east lives a very different kind of people, they have a culture resembling a little the Roman Empire. They have constant problems with a strange folk living in the hills at the west side of the Empire of Kuld, those people in the hills resemble the Caucassian tribes.

North of the Empire, in the mountains, lives a strange mountain-folk which has a culture very different from any other living in Melir. They live still in a feudalistic nation, ruled by nobles. The country of those mountain-people is called Neherik and they keep mostly to themselves.

In the south live three nations of black color. They are former colonies of the Empire and Sargaubon, which freed themselves in bloody wars against the colonial homelands. East of these nations, inside the jungle, live several native tribes with a animistic culture, resembling the religions of the black Africans.

 

 

Falgwon: They are not humans, but look similar. Falgwons have green-brown skin and are a little smaller than humans, they live in the woods of the semi-island called after this strange race. To protect their holy woods they kill every unallowed intruder, but their natural power is weakening with every tree that falls under the axes of men.

 

 

Mak'dalbor: Also called "Stonepeople". They live together with the mountain-humans inside the huge mountains called Sukatmeryan, the "top of the world". They are made of stone and when they die they return to it. There skin is grey and they live in a hierarchic culture, the mountain-king on the top. Everyone who passes their mountains unallowed is killed by them with their axes and swords or finds himself being turned into stone.

 

Ukrazdal: Most other races hate this race and kill any member of it. This is because they don't really look nice. In fact, they are quite ugly. They are predators and have long, sharp teeth, their skin is gray-green and they have large green-yellow eyes, glimmering in the dark. Because they are hunted everywhere they go, they became the best weaponbuilders and smithes in Melir. Almost every invention, which allows to kill someone, comes from them. They are not evil, even when they look ugly. But they are forced inside the role of evil creatures and acctually accepted this role. Their sudden attacks are feared by everyone living in the valleys of the mountains. Nobody dares to cross land belonging to them, it is suicide.

 

 

Faerikdars: This is a human word which means "Bear-men". The Faerikdars call themselves Gud-ugar. They are bigger than men and are covered in brown or white fur. Because of this and also because they are considered primitive they are heavily hunted by humans. But the Faerikdars are not primitive at all, they have highly advanced philosophy and live in harmony with nature. Harming nature is considered an unforgivable sin, everytime they have to kill an animal, they beg for forgiveness and thank the animal for the meat which allows the Faerikdars to live on.

 

 

Nairi: They are a strange people living on islands in the south. By colonialists they were discribed to look like apes and to live in the trees. But they aren't apes, they are about the same intelligent as any other intelligent race on Melir and have built vast cities inside the woods.

 

 

 

The World of Melir:

 

 

Melir possess only one known continent, which is called Melir (obviously). It is divided into a northern and southern part by huge mountains, called the Sukatmeryan, the top of the world. In the north live the Faerikdars, the Vikmaers and the Hardwargs. The Faerikdars travel the tundras of the north as nomads, while the Vikmaerians and Hardwargians live on the coasts in cities.

In the west, but south of the mountains, live several nations of relatad people, but only one will appear in the book: The once mighty kingdom of Lizarke, probably the oldest state existing (over 2500 years old). East of Lizarke there is Neherik, a country ruled by a "council of nobles". Some of the Neherikians live in the valleys of the mountains and became friends with the Mak'dalbor. Together they are defending the mountains against any new settlers. In the eastern parts of the mountains the Ukradzdal.

South and East of Neherik, the Empire of Kuld streches itselve from the eastern Sukatmeryan to the mountains of the south and then westwards toward the hills of Kuld. This huge Empire is governed by an Emperor residing in the huge city Makdau by the Eastern sea. In the hills of Kuld the hill-people live, which are alway fighting to free themselves from the empire. They are Sratuaists, a complete different religion from the official Belarism-religion. Advised by the religious leaders from the desert tribes the hill-people fight their "holy war".

West of the Empire and South of Lizarke lies the Republic of Sargaubon, the only democracy in Melir. It is a rich and advanced nation, the sciences are thrieving there. Sargaubon hasn't any official religion but an official ideology, called Dorhekism. They believe that every human is equal and in order to create the utopic paradise all humans have to work together (Dorhek is the sargaubonian word for community) and in order to do this have to lay aside their differences, like religions, beliefs, nationalism, patrionism etc. The Sargaubons are also famous merchants, formerly they possessed a colony in the south, which freed itself some years ago before the novel takes place. Tension is rising between the Empire and the Republic, a war must soon come...

South of Sargaubon lies the desert-semi-island called Erkat. There the desert-tribes live, they are nomads who have cities on the coast. In these cities they trade with other tribes or foreigners and also religious schools can be found in those cities.

A little east to Erkat lies the semi-island Falgwon, which is covered by a huge forrest in which the Falgwons live. A vast tree-city can be found at the border of the wood-kingdom, only there can foreigners come into the forrests.

And finally in the Southeast, south of the southern mountains, lie the black lands. The newly freed nations Rukand, Suhuka and Wakango exist there, Wakango is experiencing a bloody civil war between the democratic guerillas and the troops of the king. In the eastern jungle live barbaric tribes, which always invade the civilized cultures on the western shores.

[hundinman]

souns excellent. from what i see and remember this is really original. I see no likeness with any other novels of this fashion. keep up the ggod work. I am actually working on my own world with different races and I have written a simple elvish language that is fun to speak. (but hard to pronounce the straange accent marks I made up)

[loveme4whoiam]

Hmm, we like :) . See my PM.

[Zmid]

All in all, excellent work. You have the basis, at least, of a well constructed and thought out world, and you have obviously given thought to how the various peoples interact with each other. The only vague similarities I see are between this and real life, which is no bad thing. In fact, I would say it's quite a good thing.

 

The only (slightly) negative thing I have to say about it is that, you don't explicitly say this, but I get the impression the people are at roughly Middle Ages technology and you have a democracy. I find this a little unbelievable, as a democracy (in my opinion, anyway) is only really workable in modern or recent society (recent being the last 200 years or so). What I would do is make this an extremely benign monarchy, ie a wise, kind, king who listens to his people and goes out of his way to find out what his people want and need, but is still a king, so is answerable to nobody bar himself.

 

But maybe that's just me. :lol:

[Peregrine]

Uh, you do know where and when the first democracy was, right? I'll give you a hint, it was a lot more than 200 years ago...

[DreamOfTheRood]

Uh, you do know where and when the first democracy was, right? I'll give you a hint, it was a lot more than 200 years ago...

Agreed. There were Greek city-states that used a democratic system. I believe Athens is the most well-known ancient democracy, although that was a very corupt government.

 

When you're writing a novel (or really any kind of story), you can write and work on the world all you want, but the world will not come together unless you have believable characters. This is what was completely missing from your post. You make no mention of any plot or characters.

I take it that you are a fan of fantasy novels. Well, go through those fantasy books, find out the similar themes (usually, fantasy novels deal with race and 'the overachieving underdog hero beats the ultrapowerful, world-wanting bad guy) and do something completely different. Don't do a man vs. man story, because it's overplayed unless you do it REALLY well. Do a man vs. nature story or a man vs. self story.

All of the races seem to be rather murderous and hateful towards each other. If the world is full of hate, you have to make that point very early in the book, possibly through some intraspecial brawling.

Secondly, I just want to make an aesthetic point. The names of your places and races are all rather difficult to pronounce. You use a lot of hard consonants that run together in awkward ways. I would go back and rework those names to something that is easier to read. It's okay to have a few hard names, like your human names, as long as they are indicative of the main character traits of a race. For instance, the Vikmaer kingdom must be a proud, hardy people, because the name is indicative of Vikings.

[Darnoc]

Have I really to remind you that in the Middle ages a democratic state existed: Switzerland (I am Swiss). And Sargaubon and the Empire are at the technological level of the First World War.

 

Melir should be a mirror of our todays world (you probably saw the paralells: religious wars, terrorism, globalization, post-colonial-wars, environmental pollution, racism). Also one of the major themes of the novel is the contrast mythology (all the mythical races) and modern world (science and development).

 

Well, about characters:

 

 

 

The Characters:

 

 

Felion Mardumak:

 

He is a sargaubonian trader and strongly beliefs in Dorhekism. Because of this he often runs into problems in different countries (he sold weapons to guerillas in the freedom-wars in the colonies and helps a revolutionary group in the Empire to overthrow the emperor). He is a free-spirit, a philosopher and likes to bring order into everything (he is a perfectionist). He beliefs in the freedom and equality of every creature and the right to fight for this freedom (or he wouldn't help rebells and freedom-fighters, wouldn't he?). For some years he was a Sratuaist (the religion of the desert nomads) and was a good friend of the Awud umi Raigad, the religious leader of the holy war against the Empire. As the story begins, he trades in the hills of Lizarke. There he meets the second main character:

 

 

Valiana Durdor:

 

Valiana is the daughter of a mountain farmer in the Sukatmeryan and once even met the mountainking of the Makdalbor. When General Silkar Daukon (the antagonist) betrayed his homeland, the empire, and had to flee, he asked for refuge at the farm of Valiana's brother (her father died some years ago). Her brother found out who Daukon was and wanted to deliver him to the authorities. But Daukon kidnapped Valiana and wanted to make a deal for his freedom. But instead of dealing with Valiana's brother, he killed him and fleed westwards. She took her brothers sword to furfill the "séf" (vendetta in the language of the mountain people), for she was now the only remaining member of her family and it was her duty to do this (Séf is a very old tradition in the mountains). In the hills of Lizarke she found Felion and together they began to follow the next main character:

 

 

General Silkar Daukon:

 

He is the antagonist, but if he is really evil, no one can say. He is coldblooded and acts only for his interests (betraying his homeland). For getting what he wants he kills and he always searches for the easiest way to do something. Of course he long ago let go of any morality. He has connections to almost every secret service on Melir and plays his secret game of war even when he is fleeing. His goal is the world war between Sargaubon and the Empire, he will make a lot of money by achieving this. He is a nontransparent character, he can change his role in one second, put on another mask which suits the situation. His reasons are unknown (money is the only obvious reason) and also his actions are hidden well.

 

 

Nbagugo Wewukore: The guerilla leader of the "Dorhekian Freedom Party of Wakango". He is opposing the momentarily wakangonian governement and its momentarily leader, king Bnaku Zutrossi. Once he was the fulgeman of the wakangonian national hero, Metessa Seekudi. After Seekudi had become president and was murdered a month later, Wewukore led his people in the civil war which lasts until today. He wants to create the Wakango Seekudi dreamed of: A free democracy, not a monarchy.

 

 

Ewalik Mazur: He is the leader of the Dorhekian Underground-Party of Kuld and he achieved of freeing the province of Dirdak from the Empire (with the help of a unknown weapons-trader, guess who). His goal is to overthrow the emperor and to create several republics in the area of the Empire of Kuld.

 

 

Awud umi Raigad: He is an Udar, a priest of Sratua, the one god of the desert nomads. He reawakend the religion from its long sleep and taught in his religious school in the city of Millah that the believers of Sratua are the chosen ones and that it should be their goal to conquer the world in the name of Sratua. With the help of Sehk Mahur umi Benid, who became king of the nomads, the nomads conquered the hills of Kuld and converted the population to Sratuanism. After the reconquering, the hill-people began their own holy war against the "faithless" Empire. Of course Awud is assisting them secretly and he travels a lot to the hills and preaches their.

 

 

Tarak-Burkon: The mountain king of the Makdalbor. He is one of the oldest beings living in Melir, no one knows his true age. He is trying to wipe the mountains clean of the invading human settlers, the only ones whom he tolerates are the mountain people from Neherik, who also fight against the new settlers.

 

 

Tragbro-bmrag: He is the priest of Mfa-kited, the "Great Spirit", lives in a cave at the shores of the great ice-lake and is some hundred years old. All four years the Gud-ugar come to him to thank Mfa-kited for the gift of nature, then Tragbro-bmrag tells them the visions he received from Mfa-kited. Once Tragbro-bmrag prophecized Felion something, but Felion kept this to himself...

 

 

Selania: She is the queen of the Falgwon, the queen of the woods and trees. She is very powerful and her force lies on forrests, but it is not enough to keep away the axes and machines of humans. With every tree which is cut down, she dies a little and looses a bit of her power.

 

 

Akruzak: He is a chieftain of a Ukrazdal-clan and his goal is to unit the Ukrazdal once again and by doing this bringing back the "good old times" when they were strong. He also wants to drive the humans out of the mountains and exterminate the Makdalbor, the mortal enemies of the Ukrazdal. And when the mountains once again belong to the Ukrazdal, he has even higher goals to acchieve...

 

 

 

Some of you complained about difficult words and pronounciations. Look at our world. Only a few languages are easy as English or German. Most languages are very difficult and very different from what we know. For example, the caucassian languages and also Mandarin are considered the most difficult languages existing. So, here is something about languages of Melir:

 

 

Languages of Melir:

 

 

Vikmaerian, Hardwargian and Lizarkian resemble a little the germanic languages (swedish, german, english, anglosaxon ect.) They are probably the easiest languages on Melir.

I'm very proud of Sargaubonian. It is a language absolutely different from any language existing. You can't put the verbs in tempi and modi, this you can only do with nouns. Verbs are connected to certain nouns and there are strict rules which verbs are allowed to use with a certain noun. There are no cases, the first noun is always the subject, then comes the verb and the other objects. To change the meaning of a word (e.g. putting it into a tense or make it an attribute) you add certain sylabs in front or in the back of the word. Those sylabs don't have a meaning of their own, only the connections between different sylabs are fixed. So, if you put "ma" in front of a word, you're indicating that this is word belongs to the word in front of the "ma" word (so it is an attribute). But when you put "ma" in the back of the word, this means that this word is the result of the action of the verb. So it goes on and on.

Very cool is also the language of the hill-people. Their language is agglutating, they don't change the words but add lots and lots of sylabs to change the meaning of one word. So in the end you can create one-word-sentences. They have 80 consonants and 20 vowels. Cool, isn't it. "hegkoerula" means just "I fight for freedom". "heg" is fight, "koeru" is freedom and "la" means I.

Oh, don't forget the language of the mountain people. It is isolating and a tune language. So it is a difference when you say "séf" (the "e" is spoken high) and "sèf" (the "e" is spoken low). The first one means vendetta, the second one murder. Isolating languages don't change the words. It depends on the word order in a sentence.

The words of the Makdalbor sound hard and clumsy, like the stone they come from. In fact, they don't know a lot of soft sounds and when they know them, they aren't used much.

Words of the Ukrazdal are sharp and snarling. They should remind of sharp teeth and predators.

Falgwon use flowing and melodic words, perhaps like Italian or French.

 

 

I will later on add something about the history of Melir, but not now.

 

 

EDIT:

 

Here is the history part.

 

The History of Melir:

 

 

The northern lands:

 

The history of the three northern kingdoms Lizarke, Vikmaer and Hardwarg are very closely related. Lizarke is the homeland of the inhabitants of Vikmaer and Hardwarg. Lizarke is a very old kingdom, founded 519 before the Fall of Demeros (from now on referred to as BD; after the Fall of Demeros means therefore AD) by the king Nalgor the Glorious of Tilderbam (this city became the capitol of Lizarke). One after another the tribes of the Disamunen-people were conquered by the kings of Tilderbam. Finally the confrontation with the Empire of Demeros came, but Lizarke survived the attack and played also a minor part in the fall of the Empire. In the Dark Ages Liarzke was very powerful und ruled over most of the territories of Neherik and Sargaubon, but the inhabitants freed themselves twohundred years later (this was in the 8th century AD). In 1231 AD king Belem III sent colonist to the northern vastes. Their ruler was Walron and he founded the later kingdom of Vikmaer. Soon he declared independece from the homeland, some bloody wars followed but Vikmaer was able to hold its independence. From then on Lizarke became less and less powerful.

Vikmaer defended itself against its former homeland and because of the long seperation from Lizarke, the people of Vikmaer changed in appearance, culture and language. One king had twins as eldest sons, after his death they fought a war and the younger twin Goderich was defeated. He led one third of the population towards the north and founded Hardwarg, a even harsher place than Vikmaer already was.

 

 

Sargaubon:

Sargaubon is a very old land, the eldest civilizations existed there, the culture of Etekwan and later on the culture of Paldargin. But the nowadays inhabitants of this country are decendants of the nomads of Erkat, the former inhabitants were assimilated or exterminated. Sargaubon was first a monarchy, but then Timun Balagen the Wise founded the Republic, after the last king had died. From then on Sargaubon became the country of development, advancement and science. Because they were the only democracy in Melir for a long time, the were considered a threat towards the monarchies around them. What added to this threat was the ideology of Dorhekism which is strictly anti-monarchical and anti-national. Sargaubon conquered one major colony and a few island, this colony was the later Wakango. 2133 the politology student Metessa Seekudi formed a guerilla organisation to drive the Sargauboners out of his country. He succeeded, but was assinated a month after he became president. After Sargaubon lost its colony, they focused on the coming confrontation with the Empire of Kuld and began to arm themselves. They invented the machineguns, tanks and airplanes and those became a major part in the army of Sargaubon.

 

 

The Empire of Kuld:

The people of Kuld are the decendants of the barbaric tribes which destroyed the glorious and huge Empire of Demeros. Centuries of the downfall of this shining civilization, the king of Makdau began to form another Empire. In only three centuries they conquered all the lands east of Neherik and south of the mountains (the kingdom of Dirdak), the lands east of the hills of Kuld (the hills were conquered later on) and all lands north of Falgwon and the southern mountains. Later on the Empire even conquered itself two colonies, Rukand and Suhuka. They lost them both in a bloody colonial war against the native inhabitants, both became constitutional monarchies.

From then on the Empire began with massive arming and weapons research. There excellent secret service stole weapon inventions from Sargaubon, they were soon massivly produced in the factories of the Empire. But soon other problems began to rise.

The nomads of Erkat conquered the hills of Kuld and converted the inhabitants (a folk very different from the other people of the Empire) to Sratuanism. After the reconquering the hill-people began a guerilla "holy war" to found a "holy Republic" in which the words of Sratua would be the law.

Also the province of Dirdak freed itself and couldn't be reconquered. The Democracy of Dirdak spreds its message of freedom every where over the Empire.

Some years ago, General Silkar Daukon tried to force a war between the Empire and Sargaubon, he betrayed his homeland to the Sargauboners. But his plans were discovered and he had to flee. In exile he still planned the war between the two major forces of Melir. Slowly his plans come to life and his twisted plot is uncovered...

 

 

The Nomads of Erkat:

The nomads live in tribes and every tribe has its city on the shore of the sea. Long ago the tribes were united, but then the kingdom of Aduirman was crushed by the Empire of Demeros. From the on the tribes fought eachother, they were only united in their religion and their culture, in the holy city of Zefeda no fighting takes place. In the middle ages the Belehu (as the nomads call themselves) were united by the Fahitikids, a dynasty of Sheks. After the death of the last ruler, they were once again parted.

But then came Udar Awud, a priest of Sratua (Udar is the title of a priest). In his religious school in Millah he teached that the Belehu must stand together to conquer the world in Sratuas name. This he called "holy war". Shek Mahur liked this idea and he united all the tribes under himselves. Together the Belehu conquered the hills of Kuld and so created a new crisis...

 

 

The southern lands:

Three nations exist south of the soutern mountains: Rukand, Suhuka and Wakango. All of them are former colonies, but Rukand and Suhuka have a ancient history. In former times those two kingdoms were united in the kingdom of Ndlamba. But this kingdom was also crushed by the mighty empire of Demeros.

After they freed themselves the three nations took different paths. Rukand began to develope and is now a modern industrial nation with a constitutional monarchy. Suhuka is still agricultural and has a high king with nobles who rule the country. They have a code of honor which everyone must follow strictly. In Wakango, matters are much more difficult. After the national hero Seekudi was murdered, a civil war began. In the end most parties were crushed and only two remained: The National Party of Wakango and the Dorhekian Freedom Party of Wakango. NPW was led by Zutrossi and DFPW by Wewukore. Zutrossi managed to conquer the capital and declared himself "king of Wakango". Wewukore held the jungle in the east and declared the "Democratic Republic of Wakango". Both sides are still fighting heavily.

 

 

 

EDIT:

 

Here is the plot of the story

 

The Plot of Melir:

 

There are several plots going on the same time, they will develope in the novel and sometimes come to an end and sometimes not (so that I can write sequels). This won't be a "hero safes the world"-novel!!! Acctually it will be a more sinister and tragic novel. The heroes (Felion and Valiana) are normal humans and normally it is not possible for two normal people to save the world. Almost everything the reader hopes not to happen will happen. A brutal World War will beginn and draw almost every nation into a bloody madness. Mythical races are standing at the point of extermination (Gud-ugar and Falgwon), acts of terrorism will shake the empire, at the same time also a revolution will break loose. The black people of Wakango will kill eachother in the most diabolic ways. The Sargaubonian and Kuldian corporation will benefit from the deaths of thousands and they will exploit the ressources. Melir will become a world of madness, death and brutality as we have it today in our world. And everything that was once good will be destroyed by the brutality and evilness of men and other creatures. But through the darkness of the world, still a little light will shine: persons acting with love and kindness while everyone else has become bloodthirsty, cruel and brutal. And this goodness will shine even brighter in the darkness of Melir. Melir will be a allegory of our own world and society and will show its most worst parts but also the best parts. Even when we sometimes think that there is no hope for humananity, we can see still it in the actions of some people. How some care and commit selfless acts of love and kindness. And this is the hope of humanity: That what those people do will affect others and will change them so that it will spread. I'll try to write the novel as provocative as possible, I hope that it will create a great shock and perhaps wake some of us to do what is right. I don't want to write a meaningless novel (as a lot of novels are, sadly), but one with a provocative message which will make people think. For this is what stories are for: To teach us.

 

OK, after my little vision, here are the plot lines:

 

The World War: Because of the secret, evil and tricky plots of Daukon a war between Sargaubon and Kuld will start. Soon the other nations will choose sides and a World War breaks out. Everything Daukon hopes for will happen, also he will not die in the novel. He wil dissappear for some times and the two protagonists will loose his track and try do other things. But eventually he will appear again and what he plans to do is acctually even more evil than anyone ever suspected... Also his reasons won't be clear from the beginning but will be uncovered one by one in the novel, as the two protagonists dig in the past of Daukons life. Daukon should be the mirror image of a machiavellian capitalist who is only interested in his own gain (a symbol for a lot of industrial bosses in our today world).

 

The Holy War: The hill-people are fighting with everything they got against the Empire. They are supported by their religious brethren, the Belehu-nomads. The Empire can't break the ressistance in the hills, where the guerillas can hide easily and attack from cover.

 

Revolution in Kuld: The Dorhekists in Kuld try to overthrow the Empire and to try to found a democratic republic. Already one province has declared itself independent and from their the fire of revolution is spreading through the Empire.

 

The Old World: The mythical creatures of old try to safe their world of magic and myths. On the other side stands science and development, but both can't exist alongside. Which will win in the end? Will the modern world of the humans win against the mythical world of Gud-ugars, Makdalbors, Ukrazdals, Falgwons and Nairis?

 

Aftermath of Colonialism: In the former colony Wakango a brutal civil war is going on and on. On one sides stand the troops of the King Zutrossi and on the other side the guerillas of Wewukore. Who will win in the end? Or will they unite against their former colonial masters?

[Zmid]

Uh, you do know where and when the first democracy was, right? I'll give you a hint, it was a lot more than 200 years ago...

Oops :blush: Forgot about them. On consideration, it could work. :lol:

[Mirilion]

Whoa... impressive.

Your world and characters seem very interseting and compelling.

IMO creating an original setting isnt everything. let there be elves, dwarves and orcs, heroes and villains,as long as the plot itself isnt too influenced by another, its all good. An original plot is a must.

Second, the most important thing is the depth and believeability of the characters. Once you have that, it can even make a good read out of a boring plot .

Third ... a map !!! maybe thats my personal quirk but i love looking at detailed and well made fantasy maps, especially ones that dont have dots and lines only, but little trees for forests, little houses for towns, little castles for forts, and so on.

[Darnoc]

I have drawn myself a map with a pencil, but I can't post it because I don't have scanner. That is way I tried to describe it to you.

 

And yes, deep characters and a good plot are essential to a good story. But I also want to create something special, something new and not just a "normal" Fantasy novel or a copy of LotR.