What are your experiences of researching a novel, anybody?

For some reason I've always found the phrase 'research your novel' really intimidating. Where do you start? Where do you look? How far do you take the research - how much detail? When do you do it - before, during, after the first draft?

Has anyone got a constructive way of going about it? Any tips? I'd really like to get over this amateurish phobia!

Ooh, I bet Emma had to do a stack for her novel. But even if you set your story in modern times, it's astonishing how far one's general ignorance can spread. This year so far I've had to interview a farmer, post on a sailing forum, email a Mini garage and correspond with a lady suffering from rhuematoid arthritis. Even today I had to check out tracklists for AC/DC albums, and the brand names for late 70s cassette recorders. The internet's terrifically useful, and certain books as handy too - the Guiness Book of Hit Singles is one I use a lot. What's nice about the internet though is that you can find info usually immediately, from disparate sources, and you can also use it to make contact with real people who can take your research to another level.

As for when to do it, there's probably no definitive answer but I've found that research before I start often suggests sub-plots and scenes and character angles, which is pretty useful. That means when you start to write you can hit the ground running, as it were.

Hiya,

I've done a lot of research too. Mostly on the internet, and with help from certain people whom I contacted.

I've found out about law degrees, and the best uni to study law. How long the course is, what it entails etc.

I've also had to find out about what effects a poorly developed immune system and severe asthma would have on a child, how it would affect their everyday life, what treatment they would receive etc.

I've had to find out about all aspects of starting up a business, bank loans, whether to lease the building or buy it outright, where to get fixtures and fittings, stock, marketing etc

And lastly I had to find out about a career working with animals for one of my characters. Animal management, which qualifications the character would work towards etc.

I think all writers who are serious about their work do their research properly. You have to make sure all your facts are correct and accurate, and the research can take a long time, but is necessary and worth all the effort.

Katerina

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PS, I did all mine before I started writing the novel, so that I could write it with all my facts ready to hand.

The greatest danger is not knowing what you don’t know. We all go through our lives carrying various misconceptions. You need to ask yourself how do I know that? If it’s something you’ve always known, check the facts!

Dee

Dee's quite right - the biggest danger is the things you don't know you need to research - like making your medieval people eat potatoes, or the American thriller writer who wrote a chase through London without thinking to ask himself if we drive on the right...

For me the research process is different for every novel, depending on what else is going on with life. But I research the basics before I start: the facts that will wreck my plot if I get them wrong, and reading round to get a feel for the period: social history, literature of the period and so on. I buy books and maps I'll need for too long to rely on the library. Then I plot and write the first draft, picking up bits on the internet if I can do it quickly without losing the forward drive, and making notes about everything else. Then I start revising, and do the rest of the research alongside, often on a day when my cold/hangover/stress levels won't allow really creative work. That leaves room for the serendipity of coming across things in research I'd never have known to look for. Often I'll go back to a book, so I make notes of where I found it. It's more annoying if you have to trek back to a place, but I've done that too, when I realised I hadn't found out the right things, because what I want to happen there has changed in the writing.

Learning to Google really skillfully is the best tool, including looking for images. I mean, how else was I going to work out if you can give someone a blow job in a Hansom cab?

I also bought a big nursing text book - much more use than a medical one, because it tells you about symptoms and treating them and how the patient feels, as well as the basics of the the science. And Brewers' is a goldmine for odd things like the names and times of the canonical hours and the different seasons for different game.

I had to give a workshop about historical research at Brisbane, and in thinking about it, shook out four headings for the kinds of things I need to find out. I think similar headings would apply to all kinds of writing. Of course they must overlap - it works much better if the things you choose to paint the scenery with also have some metaphorical significance, and so on.

1) scene-painting (clothes, food, transport, names of painters, newspapers, how rooms are arranged and furnished)

2) important information that could wreck your plot or the reader's faith in the book (travel times, postal systems, how households and regiments are organised, how ships are rigged, how horse-transport works, how news and information is spread, how illness is treated)

3) manners and mores (gender relations - not just romantic ones, religion, symbolism and folk beliefs, crime and punishment, trivia like that everyone everywhere till the 1950s would have their head covered, class - so important and so easy to get wrong

4) voice - the most mysterious for me. Reading the literature of the period is a start, or raiding the National Sound Archive.

And then you have to forget it all. Or at least, leave it all behind, so that you don't import lumps of it into the writing. The worst writing is done with the textbook in the other hand - your story will read like a textbook. Rather than doing that, while I'm writing the first draft I try to rely on my memory, and check later.

The real test is, are you writing with the immediacy and authenticity (and perhaps lack of detail) that you would if you were writing about your own life and surroundings. If there's the least whiff of info-dump, your book will be dead in the water.

It's not 'write about what you know' it's 'write about what you can make the reader believe you know.'

Emma

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Meant to say, Dee's test for whether you need to check it, 'How do I know that?' is terrific. I'd not thought of it like that before.

Thanks guys - that's a great help from you all. I like the Hansom cab example Emma :-)

So what's it like talking or writing to people as research? Are they generally quite willing to help? I'm (obviously!) an unpublished writer, so what response do you reckon I'd get?

You'll almost certainly be asked if you're the next JKR, I'll tell you that now, so have a polite smile ready.

I've found that people are generally flattered to be asked as long as you ask nicely. I've had a few dead-ends - the local sorting office wouldn't let me look round their office in case I divulged corporate secrets (to whom?), and I once had a wasted afternoon in a timber yard because the guy who'd agreed to be interviewed had buzzed off and left someone in his place who didn't want anything to do with it.

The main thing is to be tactful, pleasant and transparent in your approach. And if you're getting nowhere, call it a day and look elsewhere.

For myself, I found it hard to talk to people before I was published, but it was a big help once I was doing a Masters: my needing information made sense to people then, even if I couldn't point to the nearest bookshop window and say 'that's me'. In fact, I'm generally completely hopeless at talking to people, and apart from friends, barely did to anyone when I was researching TMOL. It's amazing what you can find out on the net. Even now I'd rather find what I need in a book or a website, but that's just me. It's always easy to get hold of academics, via the university website, and I think people are often much more willing to answer questions by email in their own time.

Tori, don't forget WW - post a question, and you'll get a host of answers and more leads. The quantity of expertise and plain obscure knowledge swashing around on this site is amazing. And other forums for other subjects can be helpful too. There does seem to be a group for just about anything.

And yes, prepare the big smile for when they ask you if you're going to be the next Dan Brown...

Emma

I think the most important thing is detail. You may not include it all in you work, but you need to be absolutely sure of your facts.

For example, one of my characters fell in love with an italian film star in the sixties and i want them to have met in London. Sounds simple enough but nevertheless i will research thoroughly, get a sense of what the italian film industry was like at the time, what sort of films he might have made, even though that won't be mentioned in my book.

The great thing about researching in depth - as long as you don't use it as a tool for procrastination - is the wonderful ideas you stumble across for subplots. This has just happened to me whilst researching the italy theme and i'm really excited.

Enjoy yourself

Casey

That's really interesting, Emma and Lammi - thanks.

Casey - that's a good point. I'll look forward to all the oddities and fascinating titbits that can be uncovered.

Cheers guys

Yes, and you get to know lots of things you wouldn't have otherwise known - great for quizzes!

So, you end up knowing a little bit about a lot of different subjects.

Katerina

Very true.

If you want to write something which will be factually accurate, I would advise that work on the premise that you know nothing, and research on that basis. I would also warn that while the internet is a great source of information, the accuracy, specifically factual accuracy of that information is not necessarily reliable.

That's a good point, Bartender.