Learning While Writing

The advice I heard when I first started writing fiction, was this: “Write what you know.” Well, that didn’t work out very well, because I soon discovered that I just didn’t know enough.
So what to do?
I ventured into new territory and took some chances. I began writing what I knew absolutely nothing about, and guess what? I discovered I could learn all kinds of new things.
My first story was about cutting. When I first heard about young people who cut or self-abused in other ways, I was shocked. Then I wanted to know why. It was complicated, but self-abuse was a growing issue–still is. Since Sliding on the Edge was published, there are a lot of other young adult books that address it, and in my opinion, the more that’s written about this, the better.
With Double Negative, I had a chance to explore the issue of illiteracy. I discovered that 1 in 7 people in the United States can’t read. They can’t read a newspaper in print or online. They can’t read instructions on medication. I also discovered a lot of programs that are available for those who want to learn to read, so while that 1 in 7 statistic isn’t positive, the fact that there’s help out there is.

With Shattered, I stepped into a very large sea of uncertainty. I’d lived with people who were disabled, but I wasn’t disabled myself, so I had to do a lot of research in addition to drawing on the experience of those I knew very well and loved. What this book has taught me is probably more than any of the others. I’ve posted before about how people with disabilities are under-represented in books. Like any group, they deserve to have stories, and not stories that depict them as different, but stories that depict them as people.
So what do I want to learn about next? The story’s on my C-Drive, but it has a way to go because this topic is really a big challenge for me. It’s something I hate to read about and something that I dread happening. Unfortunately, it happens all too frequently. I’m still not sure I want to move forward with this project, but I’ve carried it around in my head for a while now, and based on previous experience, it probably won’t go away until I put the story out.
If you write, do you stick with what you know, or do you explore themes and topics you want to learn about?
Quote of the Week: The heart and soul of good writing is research; you should write not what you know but what you can find out about. Robert J. Sawyer, Hugo and Nebula Award-Winning Author