Inspiration

Travel can be scary and stressful. The last time I flew, I declared I never wanted to be in sight of an airport ever again. I do not enjoy being trapped on a plane or in a car for hours on end, or having to sleep in strange places and live out of a suitcase.

But traveling can also be inspirational. Going to different places and learning about them first-hand is my biggest source of inspiration. In one of my current works in progress, my heroine goes to Rome and Florence, and through her I re-experienced some of my favorite places in Italy.

The thing is, I would never be able to write a story like that if I hadn't been there. I'm horrible at translating descriptions into a visual reality (one of the reasons why I dislike long descriptions in books), so if I tried to write about Florence based on guidebook descriptions, it wouldn't make any sense. But I also wouldn't be interested in writing about Florence if I hadn't been there--I wouldn't have anything to connect it to in my mind that would make me think, "This setting would be perfect for a story!"

Whether it's horrible or fun, travel is an experience. Going to other places makes me think, "What would would it be like to live here?" and have some first-hand experience to help answer that question. The rest is inspiration.

This post is part of Blogust. Check out Beyond Elsewhere for topics, information, and to sign up.

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Why Do I Write?

Hello, my as-yet small group of readers. Since this is the official start of my blog, I thought joining Blogust, hosted by Beyond Elsewhere, would be a great way to kick things off. What is Blogust? Basically posting every day in the month of August. There are daily prompts that sound really interesting. I encourage you all to join!

Today's topic is very appropriate for me: Why do you write? I like most people write simply because they want to communicate, and I do too. Writing is one of the few mediums where I feel absolutely comfortable expressing myself. At the same time, writing is mysterious--how does a story work, what makes a book "good" or make it click with certain readers put others off? Where does inspiration come from? There are no certain answers to these questions, and anyone who says otherwise is putting you on.

To me, writing is a world of possibilities--a world of ifs instead of thens. When you open a book, anything can happen. One of my earliest memories, in fact, is of sitting in front of my mom's bookshelf and imagining what stories were embedded in the pages of all those books. Writing has just as much, if not more, chance for possibility and discovery, if you're willing to wonder.

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