Research and Writer’s Block

Research to me is a huge, fun aspect of writing. I like to learn things. The danger of research, for me, is that I get carried away. I can read for hours about crazy or interesting subjects. I read, I watch videos, I look online, I talk to primary sources and I become consumed. And in reality, with all of that research, maybe four lines will actually make it into my book.
I love doing research so much it becomes distracting. So now, what I do is limit the research. Now I’ll have any online research done by someone on my team and ask them to send maybe just the top 5 articles on something and I keep my primary resources, which are people who have expertise or experience on a topic, to just two or three people.
I love learning, so research can be my most distracting things and I have to make myself not go crazy with it.



Of the research I’ve done I became extremely interested and intrigued by computers and how to keep people from hacking them, and how people could hack them. Technology isn’t my forte and it was shocking to me the number of people who did understand it.
For Covert Game I had to do a lot of that kind of research and it fascinated me. I’m sure I spent way too much time on the research. I had a primary resource who used to work in the defense department and I spent so much time asking questions that I knew would never make it into the book, but I just couldn’t stop myself.

Finding primary sources happens often in person, at conventions or traveling. I’ve just fallen into meeting experts and interesting people and asked if I could talk to them. Sometimes what they did and knew inspired an idea I could use in a book and I’d ask that person if I could contact them later.

I remember that, in the case of the Shibari I used in Shadow Reaper, many years ago I had seen a stage performance of a husband and wife doing Shibari and I thought it was stunningly beautiful and wanted to know more about it. I later bought books about it, not realizing I’d put it in a book, but when I decided where I could use it I did reach out to some riggers and experts in Shibari.

What was the most challenging for me was finding out about the music business. I am not musically inclined whatsoever, which was particularly difficult with Jolie’s book in Turbulent Sea. I tried to get in contact with Gloria Estefan, but in the end that didn’t work out. I had to rely on roadies and some acquaintances.

It happens sometimes that your resource isn’t what you’d hoped, or doesn’t show up.
Oddly, the expert I thought would be the best for Shibari ended up not being helpful at all and the man that I thought would be the least helpful ended up being amazing. So, don’t be discouraged if the person you think is going to be the one to help you doesn’t, it could be the one you least think will help, or get back to you, that comes through.

WRITER’S BLOCK



It’s not like I’ve never had a time when I’m not sure what I’m going to write, of course I’ve had that, but I have a personal policy that, if I can’t figure it out in 2 hours I figure one of two things have happened.

WHAT MAY HAVE GONE WRONG

1. I’ve inserted MY reaction into the story. Every writer has to step back and everything you’re thinking or feeling, how YOU would do something has to take a back seat. You have to consider what the character would do. Ask yourself what motivates them, why they act the way they do. And the reader doesn’t have to understand that, but you, the writer, must do. The character has to live and breathe. They have to have real reactions and they may act different from you.
For example, if you have a character that’s submissive, but you yourself are not a submissive person and someone says something to them and they do it, you may think to “No way in hell am I doing that!” and then you have them react like YOU instead of like them, your story stops dead in the water and the story can’t go forward. So you have to backtrack and identify where you went off the line. It could be several pages back or a chapter back or it could be your favorite part of the whole story, probably because he reacted the way you would react, but you have to take it out of there.
You have to know your characters. What motivates them, what they would do in any situation? Don’t write the same character over and over and over as you start a new book with new characters. The world is very diversified and everyone reacts differently to various things, and your characters have to as well. Really know your characters and keep them fresh.

2. You can have writer’s block when you have a scene in your head that you don’t want to give up. It’s an amazing scene and you’re trying to force your story to go down this path, to get to the place so you can write this amazing scene, or to tie it to a scene that you’ve written earlier, but you can’t get there because your story has taken a turn on its own. And it can. And you have to re-calculate.

WHEN CHARACTERS TAKE OVER
My characters often take on the story beyond what I thought it would be. I remember one time that I thought I knew which couple I was going to write about. I told my publisher. I wrote the entire first chapter. And then, the girl entered and she’s like…that’s not my lifemate, I don’t know what you’re talking about. I argued with her, because as writers we can do that, but she assured me that my choice was the wrong one and I had to change it. And since then I never announced the names of my characters until the book is written because the characters always take on a life of their own and start dictating to me. That’s the way it should be.

THE WONDERFUL CHALLENGES OF GETTING STUCK

I’ve written myself into a corner before, but believe it or not I like that. I like the feeling that I’m reading a book and don’t know where it’s going. I love the challenge.
When I read a book I want to be fascinated with the story and feel like I’m on an adventure. If I don’t feel that way when I write, I figure my readers won’t either. I’m willing to do some research for just a few words in order for my readers to feel that. I’m willing to work at a tough scene, or even re-write a scene or a chapter in order to give that feeling to my readers.
Don’t spend too much time on research or on writer’s block. Spend your time moving your story forward.