#also just saying: a solarpunk murder mystery whodunnit would be so fun

[poetic-ivy]

I was going to just write this as a couple of replies but it got. rather kind of long I’m SO sorry (also this is not intended to come off as preachy!! I have no idea where you’re at as a writer I just get really excited about world building and the underlying mechanics of how it affects plot especially when it comes to what is ‘feasible’ lmao I legitimately love talking about this kind of stuff and am aware it can come across kind of forceful lol)

I think people will always be people no matter what society they live in, which really kinda opens the possibilities up once you start letting the setting inform that people-ness. ‘random urban fantasy but with round roofs stained glass and a lot more greenhouses’ can still be perfectly grounded in other solarpunk tenets even while still being urban fantasy. honestly solarpunk IS a urban fantasy already in and of itself, realistically speaking. but even just from a fiction standpoint, urban fantasy is a really wide genre and there’s literally nothing wrong with writing one as long as you’re having fun playing around in whatever world you’ve created.

I think a really good example of this is like. Brandon Sanderson’s works, especially Warbreaker I think. Arguably it’s just another historical fantasy political intrigue, but it’s set in a world where you can share essentially pieces of your soul (I think, it’s been a hot minute since I read it but like soul/life force is the basic explanation), and if you gather enough pieces you can use them to bring inanimate objects to life at your command. (It’s SO much more complicated than this but for the sake of brevity this is literally the simplest way I can describe it lol) The plot, despite having all the vibes of a standard vague historical fantasy political intrigue that could have been done in any such stock setting, is so intrinsically woven into the premise of “this is how this world operates and here are people just being people within it making decisions based off of this shift in reality” that you absolutely 1000% cannot remove it from that world despite the fact that I’ve read many other political intrigues that played out similarly in terms of tone and beat and character archetype (though Sanderson’s characters are also always well done and do not feel trite in the slightest). What makes the entire thing tick, the entire thing breathe, IS the love for the setting that bleeds through and affects every square inch of what otherwise should have been just another fantasy politics novel. It’s just. Fantastically done.

I’m mostly on the same page for low-conflict/high-conflict writing capabilities, and while I haven’t quite figured out the high-conflict yet, what I’ve found with the lower stakes things is just. Figuring out a way to make it FEEL high stakes. Little Maisy lost her doll and her brother must track it down through the streets/various shops or facilities before dinnertime, because it’s an antique that belonged to their grandmother and if mom found out he let Maisy leave the house with it he’s dead meat and will never be allowed to start the apprenticeship he really wants.

If this still doesn’t feel like your cup of tea that’s also fine but idk I view it like. babies. to us their problems are soooooo small like sweetheart you don’t have to cry over this loud noise or that inordinately tall man, but they have literally never heard such a noise before! they have never encountered anyone over 5’9 before! it’s the end of the world for them because everything feels huge. conflict-havers in stories are little narrative babies because they cannot see the bigger picture or the reality where this is not the most stressful thing in their lives. and as writers we just gotta lean into that and validate the hell out of their fears lol.

‘How big of an issue can you create in a solarpunk society, what kind, while still keeping it solarpunk?’ ANY kind and all the conflict, so long as it’s informed by the setting. Sure there’s not big oil or whatever, and there’s no development company tearing down the endangered species habitat to make way for more apartments or department stores, but surely there’s still forces that oppose each other? People who are still at odds? it’s not a utopia, or at least it doesn’t have to be one to still be hopeful. Hopeful settings also don’t have to preclude murder which happens for all kinds of reasons. They also don’t require all society being the same. You could have one region that’s largely a solarpunk society and another that’s very much Not, which is a recipe for all sorts of potential conflict in and of itself.

I really think it boils down to what kind of story do you want to tell? Once you know that, how do you make that story work in a solarpunk world? Not ‘what sort of story is appropriate to set in this world?’ but ‘how do I make this story fit in this world?’ (Think Treasure Island being adapted into Treasure Planet.)

So basically TDLR genre is whatever so long as you’re having fun and your sandbox feels right to you. and it doesn’t matter what level of conflict you’re going for either. I think a lot of the questions posed can be solved with the recipe of: People are gonna people, you just have to let the setting inform the people-ing and the people-ing inform the conflict.

In my experience, most stories don’t ring hollow unless the themes and foundations of story feel forced, which with my own work has only ever happened when I got too in my head about a story fitting a specific mold. which goes for literally any genre. it’s about having fun and letting the passion out to play! once the bones and meat are there then you can worry about if anything needs to be changed to tone up the narrative muscle power

I think one thing I struggle with when it comes to wanting to write Solarpunk stories is like

I like writing conflicts. But I don’t know how to write large conflicts—so something like ‘dismantling the government to install a solarpunk society in its place’ is way too big of a fish for me to fry

But also small conflicts just don’t do it for me. I just can’t stay entertained with them long enough. So something like ‘little Maisy lost her favorite doll and its up to her older brother to find it. Oh btw they live in a solarpunk society’ wouldn’t get past like one page if I tried it

But how fantastical can one get before a society is no longer solarpunk but just… fantasy? How far out of the realm of reality can you get before it just seems hollow? But how close can you stay? How much conflict can you have before your hopeful vision of a solarpunk future is no longer hopeful and no longer solarpunk? How big of an issue can you create in a solarpunk society, what kind, while still keeping it solarpunk? While still having a problem that can’t just be handwaved with ‘that wouldn’t happen in solarpunk’?

And of course logically I know the answer is different for everyone. But like. Still. How derivative can you get, how much conflict can you add, before a story intended to be solarpunk just becomes ‘random urban fantasy but with round roofs stained glass and a lot more greenhouses?’