I've started a new writing competition and the setting I've been assigned for my story is a Summer Camp. Great. I can do some research and reading around summer camps and the experience, but summer camp is a very American thing.
I'm Irish. I remember one summer our school had a summer scheme where we got to go and do some sports and a couple of visits to interesting places around the country. Getting to go to the Böse Factory in Drogheda (now closed) was a great one for me. I loved seeing how the speakers worked and how they were manufactured. Overall, though, Summer Camp as I remember it from Movies, wasn't a thing.
So, I turn where I always go: the internet. For the love of Chocolate, why is so much of this stuff promotional! Trying to find testimonial that isn't promotional is almost impossible. Given 7 days, I had to ask a friend who lived there what camp was like.
They couldn't afford summer camp. They never knew anyone who could. This leaves me in a place I don't like: I'm going to have to make stuff up about Summer Camp from the POV of rich Americans. I don't know them.
But I got lucky. I'm a member of a Discord server for RPG Players and there are a lot of Americans. I got to ask a few about their experiences of Summer camp (there's a lot of religion involved) and got some good feedback. I had to make quite a few adjustments based on what they told me, which left an already struggling story somewhat higgledy piggledy. I'm sure I'll pull something together, but I'm not sure if I can push it enough to make it real enough to get by. I'm pretty certain I'm not getting through. Given time for research and peripheral reading, I could maybe have created something that felt real (I'm remembering the book, "Night of the Moonbow" which would have given me something to work with) but I expect to get the bad news in a couple of months.
I could be wrong, or course.
Hey: wish me luck.
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