Recently, we’ve celebrated three holidays—Columbus Day,
Halloween, and Veterans Day—and Thanksgiving is upcoming, unless you’re in
Canada and have already celebrated that holiday. That got me thinking about
holidays the characters in our books celebrate. And that’s a part of
world-building.
If you have a fantasy world and/or a futuristic one, have
you given holidays a thought? Do the people worship a deity? Is a day of the
week set aside for worship? What about honoring explorers or the original
settlers of the planet or territory? Annual celebrations?
Did the explorers bring their religion and celebrations
with them from their former homes? Do they worship a single deity or multiple
ones? Your story, your world.
In Switched Resolution (the 3rd
book in my Switched series), an
annual celebration honors the Intrepid Ones—those stalwart souls who left their
dying home planet and settled on Serenia, so named because it was their hope
for their new planet.
In The Chameleon (2nd book
in my Outer Rim series), the people
on the hero’s planet honor a female deity they call The Matriarch. One day a
week is set aside to honor her.
As you write your stories, keep celebrations in mind.
Diane
Burton writes romantic adventure . . . stories that take place on Earth and
beyond. She blogs here on the 13th of each month and on Mondays on her
own site: http://dianeburton.blogspot.com/
For more info on her books, visit her Amazon Author Page.
2 comments:
Great post, Diane! My stories are usually set in the ordinary world and my characters just happen to be extraordinary (witches/demons etc). I've included some details of ordinary holidays but have yet to make some that would be their own- that is a great idea, though! (Especially since I'm working on NaNo right now and could use some extra inspiration for word count! :)
Glad to help, Maureen. :)
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