I threatened this, and now I’m following through.
Caveats before I begin: all of this is based on my own background, experience, and preference — your mileage may vary significantly.
That said, some of you motherfuckers protesting the most loudly need to read this the most, so let’s enter 2020 being honest to ourselves.
That said, some of you motherfuckers protesting the most loudly need to read this the most, so let’s enter 2020 being honest to ourselves.
If you take no tip or trick away from this, take this: research before you start a writing project. The specifics of whatever topic you’re tackling are going to affect the narrative progression — and if you feel they won’t, then, candidly, your story probably lacks depth.
What I mean is this: let’s say you want to write a story about Character A and B meeting and falling in love — if A is an attorney and B is a surgeon here are just some basic things to take into consideration beyond “they wear fancy suits and work in the big city."
Is A a Year 1-3 associate? Are they in-house? Do they work at a biglaw firm? A smaller boutique? A mom and pop? For B, are they an attending? Are they an intern? How on call are they? Presuming they’re in the U.S., of course.
Let’s decide A is a 2nd yr associate, and B is a surgical intern. They are both going to be fucking insane, barely sleeping, and working 20 hours a day. They are absolutely not going to hang out and be smooth as shit in fancy clothes at a coffee store.
If you want to write a story that borrows these professions, but ignores the realities of the work, that’s totally your call, but you’re giving up the opportunity to give A&B individual depth as well as to enrich your larger story.
So as you’re beginning a project, get to know the realities of everything you’re writing. If you do the research, it also gives you the option of making informed alterations. This is what I mean:
Let’s go back to A & B — let’s say you want A to always be hanging out at the coffee shop even though they’re a 2nd year attorney. Maybe they share an office with a living nightmare. Maybe they are realizing law school was a mistake. Maybe they are TERRIBLE AT THEIR JOB.
Whatever you choose, you’re making deliberate choices with character, and illustrating something about them as a person. If you’ve ever wondered how some writers are able to communicate so much about a character without specific articulation? This is part of it.
But there’s also a Chinese proverb that says 过犹不及, which means too much is worse than none at all.
I think we’ve all read a story that showed all the signs of being lovingly, exhaustively researched — and we knew because the writer had gone so deep they’d put every excruciating detail into the narrative.
Like — don’t…do this. I mean. I love you. I love every one of you and your deep dives, but I don’t…want to read this. If your readers want this much academic detail, they can read an academic book.
The research is INFORMING the narrative, the research itself is NOT the narrative. There’s absolutely nothing better than having that golden, perfect detail to drop into the middle of a sentence — but its impact is going to be lost if it’s one in a tsunami of facts.
All right, with those basics out of the way — WHAT are the best sources for research?
I’m sure you guys know your way around Wikipedia — but how do you get the sort of authentic, intimate, unimportant details that have people leave you comments like, “Are you secretly a second year associate and also a surgical intern?"
My secret weapon: books! yes, actual published books! Biographies, autobiographies, journalists’ accounts of major events — all of these are absolutely priceless for tick-tock style details. Moreover, they inform the style and tone with which experts discuss the subject.
Actual example: I wrote a story about the FBI, and one of my research resources was a book called Mindhunters, written by one of the guys who pioneered profiling AND was partly the inspiration for Will Graham.
Among the broader discussion of early FBI profiling efforts and descriptions of how they learned to work with local law enforcement, he dropped the phrase “blue flamers” about ambitious kiss-asses. Super inside baseball. Loved it, used it.
Other sources that are invaluable? Twitters! Weird hobbyist webpages! There’s actually a website out there that will generate a historically realistic serial number given specific details like branch of the armed forces, rank, year of enlistment, etc! This shit is cool as fuck!
There’s also documentaries — sometimes nothing is better than seeing something for yourself. And if you want an insider-y feel and look for describing a city or location? Youtube travel vlogs are amazing for this. Just pick your sources carefully.
Also, don’t ignore museums as a resource! You might not be able to visit them in person, but major collections put massive amounts of information about their exhibitions online. Plus: The Google Art project is not fucking around.
Here’s a random screengrab of some of the shit I have bookmarked for writing Reconstruction. 
In closing, I’m going to reference my best beloved Problematic Writer, Laura Ingalls Wilder and say that research is a good servant, but a dangerous master.
Go forth. Look up weird stuff. Write cool shit. <3
Go forth. Look up weird stuff. Write cool shit. <3
