April 2008 ACFW On-line Class
Research Your Way to a Book Readers Can’t Put Down
Historical Research – Let’s Talk Characterization in Time
As I started thinking about research, I decided that setting is a great place to start. Since we’re looking at historical research this week, I’m going to pull in the wisdom of many of our ACFW authors who write incredible historicals. One reason I love their books is the rich sense of characters set in time that you get. Some of these authors are debut. Others are multi-published, award-winning.
I know when I pick up a book, if I find anything that doesn’t fit the time – and I’m a history minor – did I mention that? I’m liable to throw the book against a wall or let it die a slow death of neglect.
There is a lot we can do as authors to get the details rights. So let’s dive in…
I asked authors how they turn the clock back and get into that timeperiod. Now we all write in different times, but many of the techniques were the same. For example, I was working on a book set at Fort Robinson, Nebraska during 1943 while also working on a book set in Lincoln, Nebraska in current times. I used music to signal to my brain which time period I was in. I’d crank up Boogie Woogie Bugle Boy and get into that frame of mind. If I was writing a sad scene, I’d play song like It’s Been a Long, Long Time. Now that I’m getting ready to start a second WWII series, my husband is begging me to get another CD J Here’s what others do:
For Julie Lessman, it’s about climbing into the mind of that time:
In A Passion Most Pure, the time period is 1916, which was the tail end of the Victorian influences on society when women were expected to be more modest and moral. That time period was actually easy for me because I was raised in a pretty strict and moral home where you dare not let your father catch you laying out in a bikini OR ever kissing a boy! But then for book 3 in the Daughters of Boston series, working title A Passion Denied, I had to switch to the Roaring Twenties, an era when the youth went crazy on the heels of WWI. They smoked, drank (even with prohibition), wore tons of makeup and shortened their skirts. They even had petting parties! But, since I was a product of the free-love era of the 60’s and 70’s, I had no difficulty getting into a frame of mind for the wild twenties. I guess for me, as long as you do your research, people are people, and you can relate no matter the era.
Jamie Carie tries to climb into the heads based on the education and experience of that era:
I pray that God will reveal to me the people of that time. That might sound trite, but I know He has given me characters that were like someone who lived when and where I’m writing. On the flip side, I don’t think we as writers should get too involved in the time period as to overwhelm the story. It takes on a bad taste, if you know what I mean. You have to balance the big issues such as women couldn’t work in many professions vs. just how small they might have thought. We can’t relate to a female character of the “old days” who didn’t have thoughts and opinions of her own (the sad truth is, many of them didn’t – they weren’t educated enough and they didn’t have the cultural approval to even attempt it). American women would have a hard time liking such a character . . . unless you could start her out that way and somehow, through some circumstance, have her rise above it.
Tricia Goyer takes a multi-prong approach. She reads general books on the time period; lists the dramatic events she wants to include; narrows down the basic timeframe of the novel; and then weaves her story into the true events. She also notes that well-known events build natural tension.
In Canteen Dreams I use Pearl Harbor as the kick-off of the book. Not necessarily what you expect when the book is set in North Platte, Nebraska. Yet, the opening chapter is the night before when life is still “normal.” Then bam, I hit the readers with the reality of what middle America was hearing and experiencing as a result of the kick-off of American involvement in the war. So look for those dramatic events, but weave them into your story.
Kim Sawyer suggests diving into diaries:
If you can find diaries or memoirs, they are VERY helpful in getting a feel for how people talked and what was common. Old newspapers (again, get to the library!) are also great sources for getting a feel of the time.
Which leads me to our next topic. Are letters and journals/diaries helpful resources? If so, how should we use them to enhance our stories?
Letters and Journals are one resource that is available to us as we research people and a time period. These elements can give us a great sense of what people were thinking at the time. Here’s what Nancy Moser has to say about letters and journals…
I love to find letters and journals. Since I’m writing about a real person, to find their letters—their own words—is a gold mine. Sometimes I’ve used the letters as actual letters within the story, but most of the time, I transpose their written words into dialogue to make them active and in-the-moment. For Washington’s Lady I found out that Martha burned all the personal correspondence between herself and George. It was like a knife to my chest. And Jane Austen’s sister Cassandra burned a great many of Jane’s letters—probably the ones that were the most emotional and candid (the ones I would have loved to see!) Luckily, the father of the Mozart clan had the vision to know that someday the family letters would be important and had the family save them—at least the ones he and Wolfgang sent home. He wasn’t so careful about keeping the ones sent to him by his wife and Nannerl, who were often left behind while the men traveled. It was pretty typical of the times, putting importance on what men vs. women produced, which is one of the main reasons I’m writing books about women-of-history. I want to (finally!) give them a voice.
Jamie Carie has also found letters and journals to be a helpful way to climb into her characters’ minds:
You can get a feel from someone’s spirit while reading their journal. I read lots of George Rogers Clark’s journals for my third book (yet to be titled). It was a gold mine into his character, thoughts and mind sets.
DiAnn Mills also thinks that journals are a great way to get ….
wonderful tidbits of how people talked, lived, cooked, ate, and what was important to them. A friend of mine gave me a copy of a great, great grandmother who had the distinction of cooking breakfast for Billy the Kid and his gang. She was 12 years old at the time. Wonderful journal entry.
And here are Stephanie Whitson’s thoughts on letters:
I love reading journals and personal letters. Of course the researcher has to take into account that to truly understand an event or a setting, you must read more than one person's point of view because "what really happened" WILL be skewed in the re-telling by the observers life experiences and prejudices or biases. We all know how accounts of an accident or tragedy will vary, even among eyewitnesses. So the committed researcher will try to take into account more than just one person's re-telling of an event. That being said, my writer's imagination is really spurred by reading journals and letters and reminiscences. I find that I connect with the past in a much more visceral way by reading personal accounts.
What a great caution! Make sure you don’t rely on one person’s letters/journals if at all possible, because that will give you a biased perspective. I think that’s one reason I love writing about World War Two. I have a wealth of resources available to me from movies, radio, print, even comic books. Even then I have to be cautious because during war time there is censorship. So you have to look at the whole. What was the military doing? What were the people seeing? While we may know that the Germans acted one way, if the media of the time showed them a different way that may have been how civilians perceived it at that time.
When we’re looking at resources, it’s important to be careful about what we are relying on. Be assured that one of your readers will be like me and will pick up the little fact errors that you’re sure no one will notice. Because of that Stephanie Whitson likes to rely on university presses:
I tend to trust university presses and academic publications more than generic works that do not provide the sources for their material, and I look first for print resources that include an extensive bibliography.
Nancy Moser relies on
biographies extensively—I underline and write all over the margins and then transcribe the notes on my computer. Those notes turn into scenes to illustrate what I’ve discovered. But I have also found a lot of great information with History Channel and A&E (among other) DVDs. They are usually very well researched, and the information concisely stated.
Jamie Carie found great success by asking for help from a historical society:
I asked someone from the George Rogers Clark Memorial to read my full manuscript and check it for historical accuracy. A wonderful man volunteered and emailed me feedback to make the book stronger (he also loved the book and said I had given the story of GRC new life – that was cool!). When I turned in that manuscript I felt confident that it was an accurate description of that time – that was a great feeling.
I found some of my best resources to date from historical societies. Museum curators who have dedicated their lives to the research will often write books. Better yet go spend a day with them and then buy the book. The day I spent at Fort Robinson with the curator has paid huge dividends, not just on the book set at Fort Robinson, but also on Prisoner of War Camps in Nebraska and other details. He delighted in sharing his knowledge with someone who was genuinely interested. And I’m not the only one who’s had the kind of experience.
I’ve also decided I am unafraid to email people and ask them if they have time. I haven’t had a ton of luck yet with university faculty, but I keep trying. Right now I’m getting ready to correspond with some of the British kids (not kids anymore!) who came to the United States. That wouldn’t have happened if I hadn’t emailed them and asked if they would be willing to answer some questions. I can’t wait to dig into their memories and experiences.
DiAnn Mills finds people to interview from Chambers of Commerce, pastors, and other references.
Mostly I simply ask them to talk, and I record it all. I find that interviews are more personal when I can show I’m honestly listening to everything the person has to say.
Here’s a parting story from Julie Lessman about just how important it is to triple-check those facts:
When you are dealing with history and especially a war era when things are not normal, you really DO have to read CAREFULLY and get your research right regarding dates and places. For instance, I had a near-catastrophe on A Passion Most Pure after I sold it. My editor loved it, of course, and was telling her husband all about it. Now I ask you, what are the chances of her husband being an Irish historian? Yep, you guessed it. He caught me in a huge historical discrepancy that threatened to derail my entire plot!
In the story, I have the Faith and her family traveling to Ireland on a ship smack dab in the middle of WWI, which I thought was okay because although there was German U-Boat warfare going on, it was limited to merchant ships only, not passenger ships. Problem is, my characters traveled to Ireland in the summer of 1917, and I had overlooked the small fact that unrestricted German U-boat warfare escalated to include passenger ships in early 1917. Heaven help me, I was six months too late to save my plot and couldn’t change the dates!!
After I cried like a baby, I prayed my guts out for God to give me a resolution. Lo and behold, a friend of mine suggested freighter convoys – one of the only forms of ship travel available during that period. I did some fast research and found out that although ship travel was still dangerous enough that Patrick O’Connor might not put his beloved family in harm’s way, by summer of 1917, casualty statistics for freighter convoys were almost nil. BINGO! I gave Patrick a cousin who owned a freighter company and gave Marcy a nervous breakdown so Patrick would be more likely to let her go. And my editor gave me the nod. Whew! Deep breath! J
So how do you climb into your time period? What has worked for you? What didn't and it surprised you? Any questions about these resources?
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