What if your story does not fit into any particular timeline or setting? Is this alright, because my story is a fantasy? It's kind of, um, set around a time where society is just developing, but not even that. Err, I guess it's kind of complicated. But does a novel have to refer to a specific time?
Unless it's set on earth and refers to known history, I don't see anything wrong with a... disoriented timeline, as long as it makes sense, is coherent and interesting. Especially if it's fantasy. Good luck.
I write a fair amount of alternate-history fiction. By that I mean fiction that takes place on Earth, sometimes in recognizable countries, but does not conform to any real historical period or foreseeable future period. For example, I've written stories set in North America, but a version of North America that only has about a hundredth of the current population, and none of the current political issues. There are different political issues, usually. This kind of thing is sometimes classed as fantasy, but it's not the kind of fantasy in which magic works, or elves and dwarves are wandering all over the place. It's just humans, in a recognizable environment, but with a completely different history. It's perfectly fine to do this kind of thing. People have written stories about what might have happened if the Nazis had won World War II, or if the South had won the Civil War. Change a few facts about history, and we have a whole different world.
If I may presume; I'd only suggest that if you are putting it into a setting like that, then you might consider doing research into similar types of societies that existed in history, or what we know of them, anyhow. you could either look at the rise of culture in Asia and it's spread or the various clannish superstitions or some relatively modern 'primitive' cultures and extrapolate your own from one of those starting points.
Others have raised good points; it is your story and as long as it makes sense (unless intentionally bizare for amusment or something) then there shouldn't be a problem. Set on a fictitious planet or an alternate dymention/universe/reality to our own will give you a lot of free rein I think (I'm not an experiance writer, this is just my personal opinion!).
-you can always throw it on another planet in another universe,good example being the game 'the elder scrolls'.takes place on planet nirn,a planet with two moons.seems medieval what with all the magick and the low tech enviroment (that is barring the dwarves who were technologically advanced to the point of having robots!)except if you actually research the timeline,their medieval timeline does not match up to ours in terms of years.They've been in medieval stasis WAY too long. -another example is the anime naruto.they have videos,cameras and microphones,but hardly any high tech cities.the place is almost like feudal japan the way the government and some of the villages are,etc.
Like others have said, that's perfectly fine. You don't even have to explain it, but if you want to there are tons of options. You could set your story in the actual world, but at a point in time before recorded history. There's the other way around, the far far future where everything starts from scratch. Then there's other planets, other realities, you could set it all in some sort of dreamworld... Endless posibilities.
Hi, Sounds like you're talking about prehistory of some sort. Fantasy or otherwise. Plenty of other authors have followed this path, Clan of the cave bear springs to mind. But also, if you want to have it as a true fantasy set in a prehistoric past, could I suggest Conan. Can't remember the actual lines, but it's supposedly set in a time before history began. Which is another way of saying, anything can happen. Cheers, Greg.
