December 16, 2005
Some of my earlier unpublished work suffered from insufficient research. (They also suffered from insufficient writing, but that's a different topic). This was, largely, pre-Internet.

Now, thanks mostly (but not exclusively) to the Internet, I do much more research for my novels, and it shows. Also, since turning full-time freelance nonfiction writer, a big part of what I do is call up experts and interview them. For instance, I spent thirty minutes talking to a forensic expert yesterday for a column I'm writing about jobs in forensic sciences.

Because I've largely moved from mysteries to thrillers, my books tend to be even more research-intensive than they were previously. I'm largely of the "hum a few bars and fake it" school, but sometimes I have to wonder. David Morrell, who writes amazing thrillers, does a ton of hands-on research, including attending wilderness survival schools and taking evasive driving courses. I recently interviewed Vince Flynn for a profile and he goes to the Middle East to research his espionage novels. In fact, I was given a photograph of Vince meeting with the King of Jordan, giving him a copy of his latest novel. He also told me that all his insider knowledge comes from a range of contacts he has with the CIA, FBI, DHS, DoD, etc., who are willing to talk to him and when they say he can't include something, he doesn't.

I'm not there. At least not yet. But in some ways I can see some aspect of that coming. Maybe. I have an idea for a Derek Stillwater novel that takes place largely in San Francisco. (Why? I'm not sure.) It will start in South Korea and move to San Francisco. From what I envision of this story, should I get to it, the South Korea part will mostly take place in the US military base there, so I don't think in-person research would be necessary, although it never seems to hurt. As for San Francisco, well, I've never been there and I think I would almost have to go there for this novel.

Some of it depends on the type of novel you're writing. I am routinely astonished by the depth of detail involved in Mary Reed and Eric Mayer's "John the Eunuch" novels that take place in--correct me if I've got the dates wrong, Eric--5th Century Constantinople. I couldn't even begin to write about this era, such is the depth of my ignorance. In fact, historicals prior to about 1980 would be completely useless for me to attempt.

There's a lot you can do by hanging out on the Internet, reading books and talking to people. I've been to Washington, D.C., but in The Devil's Pitchfork I was looking for some sort of park to have an ambush in. I sent out an e-mail on DorothyL asking if anyone really familiar with DC could help me out. They did, made suggestions, which led me to maps and photographs and articles and even TV/video clips of Rock Creek Park.

There's a lot to be said about "write what you know," although I'm fonder of my variation, which is, "Write what you're interested in." Not to insult anybody, but cozie mysteries about amateur sleuths are a popular subgenre, but all too often they're written by people who don't want to research anything, so they use themselves as the main character and voila, they have a novel. Sometimes that works very well. Sometimes it just seems weak (to me).

Will you get things wrong? Uh, yeah. Undoubtedly. And readers can be pretty picky about that, too. At the beginning of Dirty Deeds, Meg Malloy is working at a computer in a small server room of an internet service provider. I actually visited one. A friend of mine runs one for GMAC Worldwide, and she showed it to me and explained what I was seeing. So that's pretty much what I wrote. A computer guy came back to me and said I got it all wrong. I said I doubted it since I was describing what I saw, but I appreciated the feedback. Something about the description didn't work for him, though he's the only one who's made the comment.

I did a signing with Loren Estleman and a couple other writers and we were talking about this and Loren started laughing and told a story about an editor who didn't like somebody's novel about Wyatt Earp. When asked why he said, you placed an oak tree on that hill and there's never been an oak tree on that hill.

Well, I guess that's why it's called fiction.

Best,
Mark