
If you are interested in blogging or want to promote your book, please contact E. B. Davis at writerswhokill@gmail.com.
Check out our April author interviews: Two WWK members have new books out this month. Look for James Montgomery Jackson's interview about his fifth Seamus McCree novel, Empty Promises, on 4/4. Tina Whittle's sixth Tai Randolph/Trey Seaver novel, Necessary Ends also debuts this month. Her interview will be on 4/18. WWK veteran, Sherry Harris's interview posts on 4/11. The next in her series, I Know What You Bid Last Summer, is now available. Grace Topping interviews KB Owen on 4/25. Please join us in welcoming these authors to WWK.
Our April Saturday Guest Blogger Schedule: 4/7-Cindy Callaghan, 4/14-Sasscer Hill, 4/21-Margaret S. Hamilton, 4/28-Kait Carson.
Congratulations to our writers for the following publications:
Tina Whittle's sixth Tai Randolph mystery, Necessary Ends, debuts on April 3, 2018. Look for it here.
James M. Jackson's Empty Promises, the next in the Seamus McCree mystery series (5th), will be available on April 3, 2018. Purchase links are here.
Dark Sister, a poetry collection, is Linda Rodriguez's tenth published book. It's available for sale here:
Shari Randall's "Pets" will be included in Chesapeake Crimes: Fur, Feathers, and Felonies anthology, which will be published in 2018. In the same anthology "Rasputin," KM Rockwood's short story, will also be published. Her short story "Goldie" will be published in the Busted anthology, which will be released by Level Best Books on April 25th.
Shari Randall's second Lobster Shack Mystery, Against the Claw, will be available in August, 2018.
In addition, our prolific KM has had the following shorts published as well: "Making Tracks" in Passport to Murder, Bouchercon anthology, October 2017 and "Turkey Underfoot," appears in the anthology The Killer Wore Cranberry: A Fifth Course of Chaos.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Saturday, March 4, 2017
How Good is Your Research? By Maris Soule

14 comments:
Thank you, E.B., for the opportunity to appear on your blog. The release date for ECHOES OF TERROR is getting closer and I can hardly wait.
Maris,
Excellent advice! Sounds like you do thorough research. I believe every book needs to be well-researched whether it's fiction or non-fiction, contemporary or historical.
Yes, but I've bogged down in too much research. I think you must research, write, and then decide what will be discarded. Then research deeply those parts you keep. Knowing when and what to research is important to save yourself time. I've included too much research when I thought it fascinating. But it was way outside of my plot.
I get bogged down in research, too. I write as much as I can, keeping a running list of easy items I can google and more complicated things that will require journal articles and books. I do research chores at the end of the day.
My fictional town is in an area I've lived in all my life. It has a bit of a gardening theme and I've a gardener, too. My police force is very small so I don't have to get into any serious police procedures. When I had a Civil War Reenactment in one book, I researched guns from that era and consulted a writer friend with her husband are Civil War buffs and take part in Reenactments, and all her books are about the Civil War era. When I wrote Murder in the Corn Maze, I went through one for the first time. I have a sister who is a botanist, and a niece who is married to a small town cop.
Gloria, it sounds like you do a great job with your research.
To E.B. Davis. You are right. We can go overboard on the research. The more we know, the more realistic we can make something sound, but when the research becomes more important than the writing, there's a problem. Also, no matter how much I know about a subject, place, or object, what appears in the book is usually only a very small percentage of that knowledge, and I often find it best to wait until I have the rough draft so I know specifically what I need to delve into.
Margaret, that's a good idea. By waiting to do the research after your writing for the day, you don't get sidetracked and you know specifically what you need to research.
I write mostly about things and places with which I am very familiar, but of course have to do research at times, and I can get overinvolved in that at the expense of the writing because it's fun. (Yes, visiting an iron furnace museum was important for a short story whose main characters were iron furnace workers, but did I really have to visit three of them? Two were multi-day trips that took away from the time I had to write.)
One of my frustrations is when editors (and readers!) "know" things which aren't true, often from having a skewed idea of the conditions in correctional institutions or the rights a convicted felon will surrender in order to get parole, or just from watching inaccurate things on TV.
KM Rockwood I love that you visited 3 iron furnace museums. Yes, it's easy to get over involved in our research. And how frustrating to be told something you know is accurate isn't.
Great advice and info Maris!
Good luck and God's blessings
PamT
Thanks, Maris, for the terrific points you made. Sometimes writers feel so much pressure to deliver within tight time constraints that it is tempting to cut corners when it comes to doing research.
Thanks, Pamela. Research is one aspect of writing I truly love. I guess I'll always be a student.
Grace Topping, I understand having to work under a deadline. Although I loved it when I had contracts for two or three books, nowadays, I find it a pleasure to take my time with a book. ECHOES OF TERROR actually took me 7 years to write from when I had the initial idea until I went to contract. I don't recommend taking that long, but I needed the time with this book.
Post a Comment