I don't know about you, but I do not know everything about everything the way my ten year old claims. As a writer, I write about many things, and some of them require research. I find the research that goes into writing a novel one of the most exciting aspects of novelwriting.
Some things I find myself researching for a WIP are quite mundane and ordinary. This might strike you as odd, but when you're writing about brushing your teeth, or hitching a backpack up on your shoulder, or opening and closing a pocket knife, you might need to practice doing these things before you feel you can adequately write even one sentence about it. Writers do much more than sit in a seat typing or writing away at their manuscripts!
Other things take more research. For my duology, THE PACKING HOUSE and UNPACKING, I have researched recurring nightmares, Rorshach Inkblot tests, how to make a "God's Eye," the smell of WD-40, orange Adventurer vintage tackleboxes, Ford F150 trucks, pony cars, how to break into a school building, seeing a deer up close in the woods, the names of pencil manufacturers, names of presidents (to differentiate the teachers at three different high schools), high school mascots, and many other things. This is by no means an exhaustive list of writerly research. It's just the tip of the pencil, so to speak.
So, what about you? What have you found when you research for your latest WIP? What is the strangest thing you've caught yourself looking up for something you are writing about or for a future MS (manuscript) you plan to write? I've dabbled in steampunk, fairy tales, and ghost stories among other things. I can't let you know all of my secrets!
In the comments below, please share what fun, strange, bizarre, or otherworldly research writing has caused you to bunnytrail on for minutes or hours.
Back to research, reading and writing on my WIP! Happy writing (and researching) to you all!
trying to figure out the relationships between the Egyptian gods and goddesses is like a never-ending research project. talk about rabbit holes.
ReplyDeleteMythology is a slippery slope. Better you than me, Jessie! I loved what you did with Eros and Psyche in DESTINED, so research on! :D
DeleteThis is so true. I think one of the other things most folks don't realize is that so much of the research never even makes it into the novel. As the author we need the info to create believable characters and settings, but not always to increase the word count. :)
ReplyDeleteSarah,
DeleteThank you for joining in! I love your insightful comments. You are so right! Not everything makes it in, and there's no credit given for what doesn't find its way onto the printed page. But, at least you know you did everything you could even if it's only for one correct word. More often than not, it's a whole paragraph on the editing room floor.
Well, Touch of Death is about necromancers so the research definitely wasn't mundane, more like gross. ;)
ReplyDeleteI am *dying* to read your YA debut, Kelly!! I bet it was creepy and gross. Care to take a guess on how much of your research made it into words in your novel? Interesting topic.
DeleteWasn't there mythology in there, too? *Medusa* *cough, cough*
I love the graphic of the 'iceberg' showing the research, the novel, and the reader. That's so true!!
ReplyDeleteI've researched thyroid diseases, clinical depression, phobias, legal obligations of schools, driver's licence requirements from state to state, corsets, bible stories, labyrinths, obscure myths, the list goes on. I've even done research on a story idea only to abandon it later if it doesn't pan out as well as I'd hoped. Talk about a lot of work for nothing!
Great post. I hadn't thought about how much time I've spent doing research. It can be a rabbit hole, that's for sure, and yet it's so necessary to hold up the story.
Tabitha,
DeleteThank you for sharing. I love your list of research items. That part of us that puts on a fedora and hunts through maze-ridden lairs is worth the risk, even if, as you said, it ends up being for nothing. Keep researching, it'll keep you on your writerly toes! :D
Kelly, that's funny, I just taught a segment in my college lit class about necromancy during Medieval times. Geez, I've researched future plants hybrids, algae uses, transgenic hybrids, the devil, and the history of Afghanistan--a strange mixture for sure!
ReplyDeleteI love your spectrum of research, Catherine! Thanks for sharing. :D
ReplyDelete