Holiday Writing by Allison Symes

Image Credit:  Images created in Book Brush using Pixabay photos.

Do you write anything connected to holidays, whether they’re ones you’ve taken, or ones where you've sent your characters away? I don’t though I can see the appeal. You’ve got the chance to put your characters out of their normal environment. How would that change their behaviour and attitudes? What would be the consequences?

I’m thinking about Death on the Nile by Agatha Christie here. What was supposed to be a honeymoon trip became something different.

How could you make use of holidays you’ve taken to enhance your stories? One idea is to use the landscape of where you’ve visited as a model for the setting for your story. 

I was in lovely Northumberland last autumn and was staying near a lovely town with a gorgeous river running through it. So I could take that idea and fictionalise it for my story or I could take certain elements only and put those in my tale.

Holiday photos can also inspire ideas later. Landscapes could make you think about a fictional variety and the kind of characters who might live there. What would be the challenges they face? For non-fiction writers, landscapes could inspire articles on artists renowned for painting landscapes and there could be geographical/geological pieces to write about as well.

You could also think about the kind of holidays your characters would take and why. Would these cause friction with their spouses/other family members? Could there be humorous tales here? 

I must admit when I’m away I don’t write much. I do keep writing - I need to write almost as much as I need oxygen - but I write little pieces to keep my brain ticking over until I get back home again. Then it is fun to see what I can do with said pieces.

I also appreciate my annual writing “holiday” at The Writers’ Summer School, Swanwick. It’s great to catch up with friends and to enjoy the workshops and courses on offer. I do come home feeling tired but inspired. Mind you, I think that’s a classic sign of a great writing event.

You could also use a holiday as a way for your character to have a break from the situation they’re facing and that is where they work out how they are going to resolve their issue. A holiday can be the transformation they need.

Holidays give us a chance to reassess and have a break. We can use them in the same ways for our characters. For non-fiction, many of the holidays are based around, in the UK, Christian festivals (Whit Sunday which this year was on 28th May is just one of them) so there could be pieces to be written about the links and history here.

If your character has their own history of having disastrous holidays, there could be a charming tale to be written about how they finally have one which doesn’t go wrong.

Happy writing!