The Joy of Research (or not)

Research.

Usually, my research starts after I’ve had an idea for a book. My work in progress happened the other way around. I was doing research for The Girls from the Beach (out this July), when I came across an unrelated article that has since culminated into an entire separate book!

This was unexpected and exciting for sure!

But let’s talk about what research is really like. Research is both inspiring and exhausting! It really is. If you don’t watch yourself, you can fall down that archive rabbit hole and never come out! Well, eventually you do, but whether or not you are now armed with the research you need to write your book, or bogged down with so much information and more ideas than you can handle, is another thing.

Though, it’s not all papercuts and mad-scientist hair. Research can also reveal some pretty awesome things and leave you laughing like Ray Liotta in Goodfellas, and that, my friends, is when I love it the most.

Because I don’t want to give spoilers about my July release, I’m going to talk about the research I did for my debut novel, The Girl I Left Behind. When doing research for this book, I found something so awesome, I obsessed about it for days until I figured out a way to put it in the novel.

The Girl I Left Behind is a story about a young woman swept into the youth German Resistance in Nuremberg, 1941. When I started this book in 2009, there was an average amount of information on the internet and at my library about the youth resistance, but I knew I needed to go to the source and ask questions—I needed to ask Germans in Germany. I knew that Germans were reluctant to talk about this dark period of their history, so I looked up businesses in an around the areas my characters found themselves.

I figured that if they had a section on their website about their shop’s history (which several did—mostly about the building’s history throughout the ages) they might reply to an email. Some got back to me; some did not. The Korn und Berg bookstore was one who wrote back. The email was written in English, and they apologized for their English and the time it took to get back to me, but they wanted to make sure they translated properly.

(Literally my face while reading the email)

They told me that during a Nazi Party rally in Nuremberg, Hitler noticed the windows of the Korn und Berg bookstore and he didn’t like the shape! He broke away from his entourage, walked right into the store and demanded the owner change them out. The owner wasn’t a supporter of the Party, and I could only imagine how that scene played out, with Hitler throwing open the front door amidst a clang of bells, stomping past all the books and slamming his fist on the counter, shocking a very nervous bookstore owner. Glass was very expensive during that time, and the owner was ordered to fund these changes himself, or risk punishment. Oh, you better believe I included this little gem in my story.

My writer friend, Marie O’Halloran, is always telling me about the crazy things she finds out during her research, so I asked if she’d share some of that with me today.

Hi Marie! Thank you for talking with me today. First, what do you write?

I write crime thrillers, psychological thrillers and police procedurals. I have also tackled a police comedy, think Fr Ted meets Brooklyn Nine-Nine.

Once you have an idea, what is your first step towards research?

I usually let the idea roll around in my brain for a little while and let the scene unfold. Then start writing and research as I go. For my psychological thriller set on the Wild Atlantic Way in Dingle, Co, Kerry Ireland, I was able to visit and spend time there. This really adds to the authenticity of the writing once you can immerse all your sense in a place. If you’re not able to visit the location try to get an idea what other peoples’ sense of the place was. A librarian friend of mine suggested using a resource like TripAdvisor. For my gangland thrillers, I don’t have to look far. They are set in Ireland with everything within a few hours’ journey away. There are also ready resources available in news reports, documentaries and newspaper articles. Even though I’ve spent over two decades in the police force and while that aspect of writing procedurals means I have less to research, I still have to double-check some procedures to ensure I too am accurate in how I reflect the scenario. A lot is available through an internet search but I have the extra skill to interpret them and allow them to play out on the page.

Which book have you most enjoyed researching?

My psychological thriller, because I adore the West of Ireland, especially Dingle, and it gave me a really good excuse to spend more time there.

During your research, was there anything that blew your socks off, and couldn't believe?

While researching for a police procedural about human trafficking between Dublin, Ireland and Haiti, I ended up seeking the advice from the Deputy State Pathologist. She was so generous with her information and time. It really did blow my socks off that I was on the phone chatting with her about neurotoxins and Haitian Vodou. It also struck me how generous professions are, in general, when talking about their jobs. It never hurts to ask. For my psychological thriller I got a behind-the-scenes tour of Dingle Distillery as their location, Whiskey and Gin are included in my book. I also had the pleasure of taking the main tour which included tasting. It was very difficult to read my notes taken after the consumption of their tasty product.

What is the craziest thing you've ever done in the name of research?

I could tell you but I’d have to kill you.

😱 Marie writes as Casey King, and you can follow her on Twitter @letstalkcrime.

Research is the joy and splinter of my writing. I love it, but sometimes it feels so tedious. I once spent an hour verifying that Dorothea is a popular name for Italian women in New Jersey over 90 years old. That took a few K-cups of coffee to get through. But it’s the gems, those little nuggets of information you stumble upon that shine up and make it all worth it.

What interesting things have you found during your research? I’d love to know…

Andie

Adding Realism To Your Writing by Victoria Cornwall

A novel is like the inside of an intricate clock. Just like the well-oiled cogs and gears of a clock, a book has many elements which need to interact smoothly so it provides an enjoyable read. This week I am going to chat about a character’s reaction to a given situation. Their reaction is one of those key elements. A good reaction can strengthen the reader’s interest in the character or plot  … a poor, ill-written reaction can lose a reader’s support and loyalty.

As a writer, I try to imagine how the character would behave and think in any given situation and describe it as accurately as I can. However, over the years I have come to realise that people do not always behave how we would expect them to. If a writer captures this unexpected reaction in their writing, it can add realism to the situation and more depth to the character. It can also add an unexpected twist. Here are two examples of what I am trying to explain. They are both related to losing someone special:-

Imagine you are writing about a young widow learning how to navigate life again without her husband by her side. The story starts with a scene of her sitting by her husband’s hospital bed. They are holding hands as he finally succumbs to a long, drawn out battle with cancer. The last two years have been particularly brutal. The normal emotions of denial, shock and heart rendering grief come to mind. Scenes involving tears, emotional numbness, relatives offering comfort, doctors saying things that in the moment make no sense. Those scenes are in her future, but right now she is still holding his hand as it begins to grow colder in hers. Her love, her soul mate, her friend has just left her forever. The perfect reactions to her husband’s passing are just waiting to be written. But wait! STOP and think again.

Remember that she has just spent years by his side battling cancer. The last two years have been particularly bad. What if his personality had changed over that time? What if he had not accepted his diagnosis well and had railed against the unfairness of it all. She had nursed him up to the point of his admission to hospital and she is now in a state of physical and mental exhaustion. Her love for him had changed as his illness had changed him. The happy years of their marriage are a distant memory as his anger, frustration and physical changes had eaten away at their marriage as efficiently as the cancer inside him. He was not the man she fell in love with. What if she felt a great sense of relief at his passing? Imagine the guilt she would have at experiencing such feelings. She would feel unworthy of the sympathy offered by friends and relatives. She would feel like a fraud. In the story she will eventually learn to understand her husband's reaction to having cancer, understand her own reaction to living with someone she no longer recognised and finally forgive both her husband and her reaction to living with cancer. She will fall in love with her husband all over again as her memories of their happier times together become easier to recall. She has to do all this before she can grieve normally again and feel the true depth of her loss. Finally she learns to live without him, but her initial “abnormal” reaction actually adds realism and an extra dimension and twist to the normal grief process. Her reaction may at first seem abnormal, but it is actually very realistic. Chronic illness is a terrible strain on family members and we can add this side into our story too.

I used to work in intensive care as a nurse. After the death of a patient, I came across his son sitting in the corridor. I sat down beside him ready to offer words of comfort. We were both in our mid-twenties and had never spoken before.  Back then, if I was to write the scene, I would have had him expressing his grief at losing his father, perhaps eyes brimming with tears, hands trembling in grief, reactions all equated with grief. The reality was very different. Although he was very distressed, he did not show it in the normal way. His mind was whirring and he was agitated as he didn’t know how to arrange all the practical things to do with a death in the family.  He gave the impression of being rather selfish – only thinking of himself and all the jobs he had to do. Where would he get the death certificate from? How would he move the body to the funeral directors?  Who would he have to notify? His father had died yet he was talking as though it was a problem to be solved. However, I understood his thought processes as not long before I had been in a very similar situation.

He had no experience of dealing with a death in the family. He felt ill prepared and knew little about how to sort out funerals, wills, death certificates etc. The one man he would normally turn to for advice was no longer there and he was in panic mode. He felt his loss very deeply, but expressed it in a different way and was overwhelmed by the practicalities facing him. He wanted to be a support to his mother and protect her by doing all the practical things required, but he felt totally inadequate for the jobs ahead. He felt that he was already failing his father and as he sat outside the intensive care unit, numb with shock, he spilled out his worries to a nurse who happened to sit down beside him. Luckily, from my recent experience, I could help him more than most.

So just remember, although it is important for a character’s reaction to be a believable one, sometimes you can add depth, a twist or an added layer to a plot or character, by allowing them to react in a way that is not quite what one would expect.

Fiction by Victoria Cornwall