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The Crucial Role of World Building in Fantasy Fiction
When readers open a fantasy novel, they don’t just enter a plot—they step into an entirely new universe. From the rolling Shire hills to the frozen Wall, immersive world-building is what transforms a simple story into an epic journey. In fantasy fiction, richly imagined settings underpin everything: plot, character motivation, thematic depth, and reader investment. J.R.R. Tolkien and George R.R. Martin stand as two towering examples of authors whose painstaking world-building efforts elevated their works—The Lord of the Rings and A Song of Ice and Fire, respectively—into modern classics.