Hard fantasy

Okay, imagine you are telling a story with your toys. You have a toy knight and a toy dragon. The story starts with the knight going on an adventure to save a princess from the dragon’s castle. But instead of just making up whatever happens next, you want to make it feel like it could really happen in a real world. That’s what hard fantasy is!

It’s when the author creates a fantasy world with specific rules and follows those rules really closely. Everything that happens in the story has to make sense in that world according to those rules. For example, if the knight uses magic, the author has to explain where that magic comes from and how it works.

It’s like building a puzzle - every piece has to fit together perfectly. And when the author does it well, it can make you feel like you are really in that fantasy world.