I love maps real or imagined so this book with the subtitle An Atlas of Imaginary Lands is something I could pore over for weeks. Many of the maps are hand-drawn, some created on a computer but all charming. There is the map that Robert Louis Stephenson created for his step-son on a wet holiday, a literary map of Canada, the maps from How to Train Your Dragon by Creswell along with many others. It is a wonderful treat to sit and read them and imagine the one you might create.

So, draw a map. Aim for the moon. And as you sing your impossible world into existence, you will feel the same exhilarating joy as the three-year-old whose fingers touch the ceiling, as the Viking whose ship lands on an undiscovered beach, and as the explorer taking their first footsteps in the dust of a whole new planet.

p93 Cressida Cowell

I particularly liked Abi Elphinstone’s maps which are created on real OS maps with additions fit for a story. Here maps anchor the plot. The Marauder’s Map from Harry Potter is a marvel not just of a map but also of paper folding.

Maps are invitations to adventure, to stepping out and exploring even if it is only in the mind. They can be used for different purposes. In fantasy novels, they often build a world but in You are Here by David Nicholls Wainright’s map structures the narrative showing the long-distance path not only from coast to coast but also to love. In Orbital, Harvey uses a map to show us the direction of travel in space as the space ship orbits planet Earth sixteen times a day.

If you would like to draw your own maps, this is a good place to start.

Is a sheet of music a map? An equation? A philosophical treatise or a novel or an abstract painting? In which case, what of? Is a map only a map when you know? Indeed, the more I think about it, the more vexing the whole question of maps becomes, which makes me wonder what the map of all maps looks like. A barber shaving himself? A murmuration of starlings? At which point it’s time to fetch out the sharpest pencils and crayons and just get on with it, because what is life after all but a treasure hunt?

p191 Roland Chambers