Recently I went on a beach trip with my best friends. I had
a lot of fun, and it was a great time to relax and catch up on my reading
(which means that I have some more book reviews coming your way soon). I hadn’t
planned on necessarily bringing my characters along with me, after all a
vacation is supposed to be for R&R. However, this vacation provided me with
a unique opportunity to gain some new knowledge on the main character in my WIP
novel, Iridescent.
Iridescent takes
place in a small rural town. It’s a setting that is very familiar to me, as
it’s where I’ve lived my entire life. I’ve experienced poor Wi-Fi, crappy cell
service, and having very limited options of entertainment when hanging out with
friends, but I’ve also experienced the beauty of the mountains and nature
around me (deer are a regular occurrence, and during the past few weeks
adorable fawns have made an appearance). So I know how the majority of my
characters live and things that they can do in their free time. There is one
notable exception to this, my main character Aly.
Aly did not grow up in a rural town, she’s moved to it. For
her entire life, she’s lived close to the ocean at a popular tourist
destination. This move would be a huge change for her, and there’s bound to be
plenty of things that she would miss. While I was on vacation, I was able to
see some of the differences between a location similar to where Aly grew up and
one where the rest of my characters live.
For example, Aly would have access to more things to do with
her friends after school and on the weekends than the characters who grew up in
the rural setting.
These differences help me understand what Aly would be
missing in her new town, but also see what she would be gaining at the same
time.
There were several things that I saw on my trip that I would
find myself wishing that I had back at home, and that thought would be immediately
followed by Aly. This was something that I don’t have, but she probably did
before she moved.
I had never thought about using vacation time as research
time before now. But vacations are such a great opportunity to see things that
I don’t get to experience on a daily basis. Not to mention it gave me time to
plan out future chapters for this story and its sequel.
I usually follow a certain routine when I write. I have my
writing spot, my beverage of choice for the day (tea or coffee), and then I’ll
get to work on hitting my word count goal. However, floating around in a lazy
river with my eyes closed produced better results when it came to plotting and
getting in sync with my characters (after all this is their story, I’m just
writing it down). So I’ve decided that I should shake up my writing schedule
and try working in new places. You never know what will work until you try it
after all.
So if you’re ever having trouble getting the right
perspective on a character, try taking a little road trip. It doesn’t have to
be far, even going a few towns over or to a nearby city can give you a chance
to scope out a new setting and meet some new characters. You also might find
that idea that you didn’t know you were looking for just by relaxing and having
a good time.
