Travel Writing: Creating literary material from observation

Welcome to another installment on my writer's blog!

Finding good stories usually requires an inspiration or jump start to trigger one's imagination. You can meet and see intriguing, memorable people when going on a business trip or vacation. From them writers can recall physical traits, accents, mannerisms, personalities, and so much more. The best thing to do when fleshing out characters from these people is to jot down the most striking attributes that catch your attention. Seeing how they react in unfamiliar places or situations helps with creating a setting and plot for a story too.

Taking an everyday average human being, who has noble qualities and distinct features with a likeable/dislikeable appeal and thinking how they'd react in a given cirumstance or event that everyone can relate to leads to a basis for a story. Brainstorming will allow a writer to twink a character, to find out what works or is well suited for them. While traveling you can witness many strange sometimes enthralling events. You see how people cope with stress, heartache, being vulnerable, catastrophes, and other emotional states of mind.

Whether you meet up with a business acquaintance or have a conservation with a stranger through travel experiences a bit of knowledge about people can be learned. Simply walking into a person's office you can get insight by looking at pictures, computers, clothes, personal mementos, etc. The same applies to places. For example, when checking into hotels you can take notice to the environment (casual or business) and how people behave in such a setting. There are endless possibilities for developing a starting point for a storyline. The important part, for any story though is making sure it makes sense and will interest an audience.