The product · World Building

Your story's world,
in one place.

Characters, locations, timelines, and research. Living next to the manuscript, cross-linked to every scene where they appear.

01 · Character sheets

Know your people before you write them.

Every character gets a structured sheet: age, occupation, wants, fears, speech patterns, relationships. Add a portrait. Tag them by arc. Every reference back-links to the scenes they appear in, so you can trace a character's journey through the manuscript.

E
Elena Reyes
Protagonist
37 references · 8 chapters
Age

34, born September 1972

Occupation

Archivist. Left the city in 1998.

Wants

To understand why her mother stopped writing in 1994.

Fears

Water. Not fully — only the dark water of the boathouse.

Speech pattern

Precise. Uses "one" rather than "you." Rare contractions.

Referenced in

Ch 1, 2, 3, 4, 6, 8, 9, 11

Relationships
T
Thomas Keel
Brother · estranged
M
Mira Vasquez
Childhood friend
R
Ruth Reyes
Mother · deceased

Character sheet · Elena Reyes · linked across 8 chapters


02 · Locations

Places with memory.

Each location is a card: name, description, sensory notes, time-of-day variants, and which scenes take place there. Pin reference images. Add a map sketch. When you write "INT. BOATHOUSE," Storyforge knows where that is and what it looks like.

The Boathouse
Old rope and older water. Dark boards, slick underfoot.
4 scenes · Ch 4, 8, 11
Marley Street
Narrow. The house at number 14 has a red door.
6 scenes · Ch 1, 2, 3, 9
The Archive
Basement level. Fluorescent light, metal shelving.
3 scenes · Ch 5, 7
Maren's Diner
Corner booth by the window. Coffee is always lukewarm.
5 scenes · Ch 2, 4, 6, 10

TIMELINE · THE LONG WALK HOME
1972 · SEPTEMBER
Elena born in the house on Marley Street
1988 · SUMMER
The boathouse incident. Elena stops swimming.
1994 · MARCH
Last letter from Ruth. Reason unknown.
1998
Elena leaves for the city. Takes the archivist job.
2006 · PRESENT
Elena returns to Marley Street. The novel begins.

03 · Timeline

See the shape of time.

A vertical timeline for backstory, plot events, and character arcs. Pin entries to chapters. Drag to reorder. Collapse decades you're not working in. When your novel spans 40 years, you need to see all 40 at once. Storyforge lets you.


04 · Cross-links

Everything connects back to the page.

Mention a character in a scene and Storyforge links it automatically. Open a character sheet and see every scene they appear in, every line they speak. Click through from a location to the chapters set there. The world and the manuscript are one surface.

MENTIONS · ELENA REYES
Ch 1 · Scene 1 — The Station
"Elena stepped off the train with nothing but—"
Ch 4 · Scene 2 — The Boathouse
"She stood in the doorway for a moment—"
Ch 8 · Scene 1 — The Letter
"Elena unfolded the paper carefully—"
+ 34 more mentions across 8 chapters

05 · Shared worlds

One universe. Many books.

Writing a series? A franchise? Multiple books share a canonical world, a single source of truth for characters, timelines, and lore. Change a name in the series bible and it ripples to every manuscript that references it.

The Long Walk Home
Novel · 42k words
Before the Tide
Prequel · 18k words
Series Bible
23 entries · canonical
Shared canonical world

Build the world first.
The story follows.

World Building is included in every Storyforge plan. Request access to the private beta.