Traveling for a story!

Traveling to different places to get ideas for your story.

Hear me out, because most story genre’s don’t really require the need to do this, yet some writers do this.

Like for an example:

Say you are writing a story set in a city in your country that you have never been to. You decided to take a drive out to the city to gather some ideas for your story.

Yes, it makes sense to do research online instead of actually going there.

Yet if you want to do something different and take a shot in the dark to actually go there and see the sights in order to get a feel for it.

So, if you had the money to travel near and far to gather research for a story, would you consider it?

If you don’t want to then that’s fine too.
What are your thoughts?

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I think it’s a great idea to go to whatever place you’re writing about. But to go to a place to get ideas? Sounds silly to go to that expense when you might not even use the ideas ultimately, and may decide to set your story in a totally different place.

What bothers me, though, is writers who deliberately set their books in an exotic setting, then travel there and write the entire trip off as a business expense on their income tax. The rest of us are therefore paying for their trips. Someone admitted to doing this back in the Amazon discussion forums, and it made me mad. We should all be allowed to take expensive trips then at the expense of everyone else, but most of us can’t afford it and wouldn’t think to take advantage of other people that way. /rant

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If I had the money? Hell yes. I mean research can sure help a lot but it is really different from actually going to the place :slight_smile: I haven’t been able to do exactly that, but I have been to places that were the settings of my stories, and it was pretty cool to see how accurate I was… or what things I needed to change to make the story more accurate :stuck_out_tongue:

Closest example I can think of right now is Paris. In 2020–2021 I wrote a book that was partially set in Paris, a few years after I went there for vacation. And before my Paris vacation in 2018, I had written the first draft of that book in 2015. The difference in accuracy is astounding. I remember going around the city and noting down all the things I could add or change in my book to make things better :joy:

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That happens? :0 I had no idea! What boggles my mind even more is that they can get away with it.

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I didn’t even know that people did this. Wow.

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That sounds exciting! I would love to go to Paris.
Hell, even places that aren’t outside of America that are cool yet exciting, I wouldn’t mind traveling to.

:slightly_smiling_face:

I think it is a pretty cool experience travel and write both together.

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@stella_vigo @anon39043209

Yup, I didn’t know this was a thing either until that woman admitted it. She was self-published, and her books weren’t even very good. But we paid for her to travel, and there are probably other writers out there doing this too. (-᷅_-᷄๑)

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Wow. That’s not even right.
Damn! And there’s a place I wanna go to now and don’t have the funds.

People suck sometimes!

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Technically it is legal, though, or it is until the IRS audits you. (>‿◠):v:

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Well, sucks to be her I suppose.

Speaking of trips and traveling, I really want to do this one trip with my friend for later next year or something.

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You mean a camping trip? Or is this something else? Where ya going?

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Nope. Me and her are going camping later on this week.

But for next year, I wanna go with her to Spain or some other place.

Originally, I wanted to go to Japan, but that dream might have to die due to money issues.
So, now I wanna do Spain or some nice place.

I haven’t planned anything yet, but I am thinking about options.

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Oh wow, it sounds awesome! I sure hope you guys get to do it! ( ˆ◡ˆ)۶ ٩(˘◡˘ )

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Well, thanks but the idea is mine and I have to run it by her to see if she would even want to go.

LOL! :sweat_smile:

I hope that we can do something like that together.

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Utah looks different from the pictures online, I’ll say that

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I’ve never even been to Utah.

LOL! So, I have no idea.

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The sky is endless and the landscape is dramatic. The mexican food is also really good.

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Sounds fun.

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I always prefer to go in person, yes. I love traveling so it’s just awesome.

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The map is not the territory ~ Ronin (1998 film)

You have two choices in life; to research the achievements of others, or leave others to research your achievements ~ Ariel Sharon (paraphrased)

If it wasn’t good enough, you weren’t close enough ~ Robert Capa (wartime photo-journalist)

Fiction will never beat reality ~ unknown quote

Photography teaches you how to view the world without a camera ~ unknown quote (I wish I knew where this was from)

The smallest step eventually completes the grandest journey ~ Kyle Carpenter

There are two ends to a horse, which end do you want to deal with ~ Family saying (and possibly also Jewish saying) about Primary and Secondary source materials

I think traveling overseas to write about foreign countries (on site) is a great idea. There are so many small / random details, events, personalities that you can encounter while traveling (and can use in your writing) that you would miss if your research was just limited to books, photos, and videos. There’s also a personal perspective of these experiences that can show through (enrich) your writing.

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