One of the most interesting, and confounding, parts of writing is doing the research. As I comb through the first draft of my next installment in the Epitaph series, I'm working closely with my "fact checker," a friend who assures me architecture is boring (my main characters are both architects).
When asked, many of us might say our jobs were boring, and that will be true to a certain extent, but the jobs are only subplots to the book as a whole. During the writing process, I strive for a measure of authenticity, which means I have to learn about the professions I don't know much about. With COOKIE THERAPY, I interviewed a fireman I'd met in the grocery store (thank you, Mike). And a fireman neighbor. And a fireman on a writers resource loop. All for the sake of authenticity. It's amazing how four different viewpoints can differ for the same job, or possibly this author didn't quite understand what she was being told. In the end, readers did comment that they appreciated the authenticity of my firefighter's job in the story, so I must have gotten the important stuff right. On the downside, after talking with the firefighters and writing that book, I sat down to watch CHICAGO FIRE on television one night (shout out to Author Marilyn Brant who made a cameo) and for the first time in my life, I found myself saying "that would never happen" while watching a television show. I realize TV depends a lot on suspended belief - fake it to fit it into the one-hour slot - but this was my first experience with knowing the difference. You know what I'm talking about, things like processing DNA in less than a month. It doesn't happen in real life. Likewise, I knew the reality of what would and wouldn't happen on a fire engine. Ruined the show for me!
My process tends to be to get the story down and fix the details later. During preliminary conversations with my architect friend, I wrote the story to what I assumed from what she'd told me. Later, we met again and she corrected my misconceptions, and she gave me more fodder to work with. I met with her once more to run the rest of my work-related scenes by her and she gave me MORE ideas to update. In the end, some of it will be inaccurate (call it artistic license), but for the most part, I hope to get the details right. I've learned something more about what architects do and enriched my knowledge base, and an appreciation for what my friend does for a living.
It takes a LOT of disbelief suspension to watch most television these days. Sometimes it's the little things -- Hubster and I used to laugh at CHiPs for the way they played with logistics, getting from the harbor to the valley in five minutes. And anyone who's gone to the Writers' Police Academy knows most cop shows don't come close to reality. But they can still be fun as long as you keep that "entertainment only" filter in place.
ReplyDeleteSaw an article recently about the Bob Newhart show that I'd never paid attention to, as well. The "El" ride that opens the show takes him FAR away from his final destination. But if you don't pay attention, you won't notice, I guess.
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