Holiday time is approaching – and whether your holiday choice is action and adventure, lounging on the beach or chasing new cultural experiences, I am willing to bet that you intend to do some reading while you are away. And for most people holiday reading equals nothing heavy or professional – just a few good novels. I believe that sidelining fiction to the beach and the bedside table is missing its potential as a wonderful personal development tool. I am also quite sure that if the forthcoming prospect was prolonged isolation on that famous desert island instead of just a couple of weeks in the sun, then I would be begging for a pile of books to take with me and they would almost all be novels.

I know that my professional colleagues are great readers – the networks are always bubbling with recommendations of their favourite self-development bibles, management guides and learning manuals. Yet I hardly ever see a reference to works of fiction. Similarly there are often references to what can be learnt from ‘reality’ shows on the TV but only a few to drama or films. Is this because we believe that we can only learn from ‘real life’ or because it seems more respectable to recommend the latest management guru than your favourite novelist?

I don’t know why we are so coy about fiction, but I do believe quite passionately that fiction and drama can develop our creativity, expand our view of the world and teach us more about our fellow man, and about ourselves, than any number of self improvement books, biographies or training manuals. I am not dismissing those sources, as an author of training materials it would be perverse to do so, but I am saying that they will always leave us short.

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