Travelling to visit the setting in your novel is a great way to do immersive research. But what do you do when you can’t get there? There are many other ways to immerse yourself in a setting besides travelling far from home.

Writing retreats with an immersive component

Writing retreats are a great way to spend some quality time with your manuscript. Whether you are working on research, drafting, or revising, a concentrated effort can make a big difference. Immersive writing is experiencing some of the world of your characters and using what expereince when creating scenes. It can be an especially potent way to write with your senses.

Combining immersive writing with a retreat can have a powerful impact on your novel as you craft your historic world. It gives you a chance to focus on the experiences and feelings that can arise when in a particular place. Seeing, touching, and smelling things that your characters may have also experienced can add depth to your story. Immersive research at a particular location may not always be possible, but that doesn’t mean you can’t replicate an immersive experience in other ways.

One of my favorite writing retreats was a solo retreat that I created just as I was starting a new project. The story was about a young female homesteader in the late 1800s. I wanted to be immersed in a world made of tar paper shacks, log cabins, and wagons. While a trip to a historic village or museum would have been wonderful, it was not possible at the time. I managed to find a small cabin for rent just outside my town. Although it had lots of modern amenities added to it, I was able to imagine how it might have felt to live all alone in a small wooden cabin. The first night it poured rain. The next day I wrote a scene with rain pouring down on a tin roof. It was much easier to write about the surprise of waking up to such a noise having just experienced it.

Depending on your novel’s setting, you might be able to find a location to write in for an afternoon or even a weekend that helps you feel as though you are immersed in their world. I’ve written in museums, recreated historic villages, in natural settings, and on a boat. The locations don’t need to be a perfect match to get a sense of what your characters might a have experienced. More than anything, it can make the writing fun and spark new ideas.

Creating an immersive writing experience at home

Even if you can’t manage to get away for a weekend, you can set up an immersive writing retreat right at home. Doing immersive research from home can take on many forms. Here are just a few ideas to get you started.

1. Try cooking a meal or recipe that would have been served to or made by your characters.

2. Listen to music, radio, or other sounds of the time period. You can find recordings of different types of transportation, equipment, nature, etc. on YouTube.

3. Did your characters have any hobbies or chores that you can replicate? Maybe you could try washing your laundry by hand, or reading and sewing by candlelight.

4. Do some research to find out what the smells were like in your character’s world. You might not be able to ride a real steam engine but you can often find candles or perfumes that replicate old scents. Light the candle and imagine your character working the train engine as you write their scenes.

5. There are many recordings online that can be useful for replicating an immersive experience. If you have a character crossing the ocean by ship you can search for video of ocean crossings. Or, maybe you need to know what it was like to watch the sun rise in another part of the world. 

If you are searching for ideas online the term experimental archaeology is often used to depict this kind of immersion experience. You can also find relevant background noise for various settings by adding the term ambient.

Planning to make the most of your retreat

It can be great motivation to build in a little immersive writing into your regular writing schedule. If you do decide to create a retreat experience, I highly recommend that you prepare in advance so you don’t fritter away your time. Set a few goals of what you would like to accomplish while away and create a realistic schedule. Build in some rest time, especially if you normally have a very busy schedule. My first hour of any retreat involves doing nothing but rest.

Author Sarah Penner shared a detailed example of how she scheduled her time during a solo retreat to make big progress on a novel. You can also check out the websites for big name writing retreats as most of them post a schedule that you can use to guide your own.

Finally, don’t forget to pack all the essentials you need to work on your project. I always make sure to have good supply of dark chocolate to fuel my writing sprints.

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