: Re: How can my story take place on Earth without referring to our existing cities and countries? I come from worldbuilding.stackexchange because people suggested I post my question here: My story

@Sent2472441

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As Chris Sunami says, this isn't all that uncommon.

If you're story centers on events in one country that is not supposed to be a major world power, you can just invent a country, throw in some vague geography like, "in central Europe", and tell your story. Lots of stories are set in fictional small countries. Then you just invent whatever culture or politics or whatever you need for the story. You might have a brief mention of "the prime minister visited America" or whatever, but what happens in other countries is not important to the story, so you just brush them off.

If the story involves world politics -- as I think you're saying -- different case. If you want to create fictional world powers so that the geography and culture and politics can be whatever you need to make your story work, okay cool, do that. I think the trick is just to avoid confusing the reader by having the story start out with something that clearly puts it on another planet or in an alternate history. Like if you begin the story by saying, for example, "After the United States was conquered by the Muslim Caliphate in 1925 ...", any reader who knows anything at all about history will surely grasp that this is an alternate history story.

Or if you want no reference to real history, something like, "The world was divided into two armed camps that stood on the brink of war. In the west was the Fwacbar Alliance, and in the east was the Bramnatz Confederation. Fwacbar had the advantage of the stronger fleet of nuclear-powered aircraft carriers and battleships, while Bramnatz had the greater strength on land, with huge armies of tanks and rocket artillery ..." I think that if you don't want any connection to real history, you need to quickly establish the level of technology, or give some indication whether this world is ancient or medieval or modern, so the reader can picture it in his mind.

As a side note, there are pros and cons to both sides of real vs fictional nations and politics.

If you try to use real nations, then you create the problem that you have to make sure you don't mess up an important point. I've read stories and seen movies set in real places that I knew something about, and where I found it very disconcerting when the story get essential things about that place wrong. I recall a book I read years ago set in medieval England in which the people talk about "the gods" and pagan worship, which was rather bizarre considering that in real life medieval England was overwhelmingly Christian. I once saw a documentary set in a town in the desert in Nevada in which they're re-enactments of various events took place in places surrounded by thick forest. Such things can just be jarring.

But if you use made-up countries, you have to invent the whole culture, economy, technology, politics, etc. And even if you have it all worked out and coherent, you have to explain it to the reader. Research is a lot of work, but invention is a lot of work too.

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