There are so many fictional worlds I wish I could visit: Hogwarts, Narnia, the Shire. These places would be at the top of my vacation destination list — if only they existed in real life. Authors have an amazing gift for imagining entire worlds, and then making them real just by putting words on a page. Hogwarts may not actually exist (though the Forbidden Forest is now open in Warner Bros London and looks amazing), but in a way it did, because we all traveled there just by reading the Harry Potter series. After all, previously nonexistent worlds have been brought to life by writers putting pen to paper — but sometimes, this also works the other way around.
Many authors were inspired to write stories because of places that they visited, or lived, or read about. While fiction can be inspirational, more often than not a spark of creativity can be found in the real world, too. Story ideas can come from all different sources, including actual locations that exist. In this case, you don’t have to worry about reading the book and then never falling down a rabbit hole or crawling through a wardrobe in order to visit. These geographical locations can be accessed through the real world — here are some real life places that inspired books.