Juiced On Writing

Every good tea drinker knows there is a fine art to making a cup of tea for somebody. Tea needs to ‘steep’ just as a fine wine needs to sit around in a cask for a number of years. If I were given the choice between making coffee or tea for somebody, I would choose the coffee everytime. Everybody has their own opinion of what a good brew is all about.

I am currently in the throws of developing my next ‘idea’, and just beginning to research it. I have the idea, but it’s a very emotionally rich one, and seems to also want to steep or brew – for a long time, before I feel willing to start writing it out of my system.

Researching and steeping a creative writing idea is an art unto itself, and here is my take on the subject as I go forward with this.

How to Steep / Research a New Fictional Work

0. The Conception of an Idea

This article is not about forming processes and working them to conjure up ideas for your next novel. Author and writing tutor, Holly Lisle has a process to do this she calls “Bringing Down Lightning”. Others call their processes many other things, and some authors don’t even have an option in what they write about, as their work is dictated by a publisher for a series, or by thematic requirements from other areas. But creating ideas is not what this is all about.

Once you’ve filtered out all the unworthy ideas and located that ONE – the little blighter that just has to be written, then you’re into the Steeping and Researching phrase that I find myself within.

I like to think of the conception of a worthy idea as being akin to something like a pregnancy. Many creative writers are never short of ideas, but gestating and growing a ‘good idea’ within you can take some labour. Sometimes my labour has gone really quickly – in a matter of weeks or days. In this case, my third novel, it appears I’m in for a long-term first phrase, and perhaps a pregnancy and labour more related to the gestation period of an African Elephant rather than a human being. Or the brewing period of a fine Indian tea, perhaps.

To return to this metaphor, consider the conception and selection of the idea as being like the selection of the finest tea leaves for drying and mixing. This is your basis for the brew. Only the finest will be allowed through into the pot.

1. Let it Steep

Unbelievably, writers have one of the only excuses out there (aside from perhaps sleep research lab-rats) to sleep on the job. Or at least day dream, stare at the ceiling, lie down for a very long time, or literally do nothing more productive with several hours of your time than sitting out on the grass and picking daisies.

This need to sleep or dream on the job is not something many writers are ready to admit to, certainly not in public. But there is a scientific standing behind the human being’s need to sleep and process things within their subconcious minds, and from this results the reasoning that the same must go for a writer, perhaps two-fold.

If you don’t spend time lying on the sofa immersed in the world you are imagining, why would any reader want to lie there as well?

- Val McDermid

How Long Do You Steep (or Sleep) on It For?

Good question. How long is a piece of string? I found with my last novel idea, I thought around it – not legitimately as a process – for about a month, before I started developing and outlining it on paper. Other times the story has arrived fully developed almost immediately.

This time around, it’s been three months, and only snippets or minor ideas or scenes or maybes, if, buts, and characters arrive very occasionally. This latest idea of mine seems to want to steep a very long time. That’s not a guarantee it’s of any more elite parentage, however. Maybe it’s going to be a doosy, maybe it’s really a stinker with a poor sense of timing. Longevity in the steeping stage does not necessarily denote quality or even quantity. It’s just what feels right for the story.

How Do You Force the Steeping Along Then?

1. Only force it along when you feel the time is right to force it along. This is a gut feeling for when the time is right to move onto something more tangible (unless you’re on a contracted deadline, that is).
2. There’s nothing wrong with augmenting one idea’s steeping process with other fictional or creative work. Write a short story, poem, edit another novel, start work on another project. Some authors are reknowned for taking years to steep an idea, even decades for some famous works.
3. When the time is right, then there are several methods to stir up the story and steeping process a little.

2. Stirring Up the Story Brew

This is the point that I find I have now come to. A point where my inners are starting to suggest some frustration with lack of progress with my story, even though it’s still quite nice to have a quick flash or day dream about it. Even though it’s still quite muddy.

For my own story, this feeling has been moved along by external forces this last week. My story centres around, although it’s very different to, a subject which has suddenly taken precedence in the world media this last week, with two different destructive events happening in the U.S.A. Those events aren’t exactly what I’m thinking about writing around, but some aspects of them are close enough to trigger in me a need to move on from the dreaming stage.

Methods to Stir Up the Story

To be done in cohesion with more dreaming. These methods, I’ve found, help to stir up those dreams and thoughts, and characters and story arcs begin to develop. It’s perhaps still too early to write these down, but if the same thoughts start creeping back, then you know you’re onto something.

1. Brainstorming – simple key words – these may start off with a very large picture, dealing with themes and ideas, and drill down more into characterisations and smaller details. I will stick with the bigger picture initially, stopping myself from getting down to details, because I want to give the story time to develop and change.
2. Read the genre – something you’re probably doing already anyway.
3. Media Events – as with my example above, if you find some world or news events are compatible with your idea, search these out. Clip out the newspapers, or look the news up on the internet. Go through and highlight the elements of those stories which trigger your own thoughts.
4. Ring the most appropriate key words out of all of this, and take to the internet with a good search engine.

A Good Research Tool Kit

Before I go any further, once I’ve found that very first piece of research at the stirring up stage, I setup my tool kit to take these into.

Many who have read here at my blog may be aware that I have a few research databasing and organising methods. But it’s not the tools that count, but the process of starting and organising those materials which can trigger additional thoughts.

For web-clippings and general notes I start off creating and labelling a project notebook within Microsoft OneNote. That’s where I’m currently concentrating my efforts. Once the actual story develops more – with character profiles starting to develop, then I will do that within my own writing and project management tool.

For fictional work, I tend not to take internet or web links or bookmarks – I never go back to those same sites, and don’t find I have a need to do so. Instead, I take full pages or partial text clippings into my notes database. The copy and paste facility within OneNote brings in the original URL for reference, should I ever need it.

Note that other more general research and clippings – those that I find outside of a planned research session for my novel – are filed elsewhere. I use Evernote, which has an online database, and I can use on a PC client copy, and synch with my iPhone.

3. ‘Proper’ Research

Once you’ve made that first step into stirring up the dreaming process, and setup your research tools / databases, you’re possibly ready to move into the ‘proper’ research phrase of your writing project. I’m not quite there yet with my own story, but regarding this phrase, I have to state that I love it! (see Point 4 Below, it’s important too!). But to get the best out of this phrase you need to develop some good methods behind your research.

There are two points which you should already be developing before moving properly into the research phrase of your fictional work -

• Genre(s) – where does this story fit? What patterns are expected from readers? What elements?
• Key Words and Phrases – which words really trigger your ideas – are they theme, emotion, event specific? Which need research?

A Good Research Methodology

Non-Fiction writers – particularly journalists, students, and even some professional vocations are provided with training and knowledge on developing research and analysis skills. Fiction / creative writers often come into writing without an initial sound understanding of how to go about researching at all.

Developing this is often a little hit and miss, and certainly too locale specific for me to advise anybody else how to go about doing it.

The Pleasure (and Pain) of Books

As an example, many authors suggest spending some time at their local libraries, and certainly developing a good working relationship with their friendly neighbourhood librarian. This doesn’t work for me, where my local library consists of a small volunteer-driven pre-fab building holding mainly children’s books and the odd best-seller, but no periodicals or reference books.

Others suggest if you can’t use a local library (or don’t have one) you can order in reference books. This is a brilliant idea, and one I, as a book lover, have previously pursued. But from this, I can give you one word of warning from one new writer to another – until you find yourself set into one or two genres, reconsider whether your huge love of mythical fairy reference books will still be needed several months or years down the line. Sometimes once that new story is out of you, you find all those reference books are now no longer really needed.

For those who are pretty sure you will be writing in the same genre for some time, then go ahead – buy a few books. Try to locate ‘the’ reference ones, and do a bit more research through internet sites on the genre itself – writing websites will often give you a list of books and journals which make good additions to your reference library, particularly those dedicated to the genre.

Speaking with Experts

My next story involves a number of crimes. For this, I’d dearly love to be able to get a grasp of the police procedures in this country, and not just those I see possibly erroneously portrayed on U.K. television soap series. But finding a friendly professional copper with enough time to support my many questions is a large thing to ask. I personally may have one inroad to this type of expert, as I happen to be living next door to two detectives for the county, and if they don’t have the time or patience, at least they may be able to put me onto some person who may welcome my interest in getting things right for the story.

Such experts have a two-fold promise for your work. There is a secondary side to finding and cultivating these gurus – if close enough, or if you’ve really built up a good relationship, they may be available as a sounding board for your starter ideas – in fact they may even add some more ideas to the pot.

But primarily, your gurus or oracles can provide detailed and up-to-date real-life information about how things work.

Which brings up the subject of interviewing and questioning such experts if you are lucky enough to source them. Whether your interview is going to be in-person, over the phone, or via email, you must be organised in your approach.

To be fair on their own time, I would suggest that asking them such random questions early on in the research piece may be very unfair. Better to store up any questions as they occur in your own story development, and if need-be, even through the actual writing. Develop a questionairre sheet, referencing to what part of the story you need that information for, and see if you can not find out the answer from elsewhere first.

That elsewhere could well be the internet, naturally.

The Web

Now that we’ve moved onto the internet, the need to develop a good methodology in research goes three-fold. How easy is it to become distracted by something you’ve seen on a website, and go off winding along the web and never find that one website again? How many hours can you spend and come off the web without anything productive? Yeah, I know. I’m absolutely brilliant at this so-called research. I can spend days and get nowhere.

I have developed a method where I never move onto one page without first taking a web-clipping of anything I may want from that first one. I also open up subsequent pages into new tabs, occasionally closing down older tabs in my browser. I search via key words and phrases, but also have learnt to look outside of the main pages, at sidebars and advertisements. After all, you never know for fictional work, what might trigger that one dazzling plot turn.

Here’s a list which may be helpful of certain types of research you may want to contemplate over the internet: -

• Genre Specifics – if your story is a romance, horror, science fiction, or crime, then there are associations and websites out there with lots of information and help for you (including the lists of reference sites and books I spoke of earlier).
• News stories search – enter your main key words. See what comes up.
• Key Word Search – enter your main key words. Follow the trails.
• Specific Research Requirements – as one example – for a historical piece, you may have set your mind on a certain time period, certain civilisation, or certain place as a setting. Another example – your crime story will require some knowledge of the laws within your country, and policing. You may need to research these to add detail…

4. How Much Detail, and When Do I Stop?

Initially I thought this was another piece of string question. It all depends, or does it?

For a plausible crime story, for instance, the author should have a good understanding of many things – how the crime can come into reality, for instance (is it really possible to die from an exotic spider bite? Does a body really decompose like that? ) And the people and procedures around the crime – (Would a police team really be made up of a student anthropologist and a Detective brought out of probation because he’s really needed? And how many policemen really are on probabation out there for hitting their superior officer? Heck – do they call their manager’s ‘superior officers’, even?)

For a plausible science fiction piece, the world is your oyster, right? Wrong – there are certain laws of nature and elements within even science or speculative fiction and if you break some of these, with no proper explanation of how these could be broken, then you reduce the acceptance of your story by the audience you’re aiming for.

I love to research – I perhaps should have been a Researcher by trade, but even then, I would have gotten bored with the same subject materials, and only like now to research things I am extremely interested in.

But I could spend months on researching my subject, I’m sure. And what would I do with all that pleasurable effort? Why, I’d want to prove it worthwhile within my story, wouldn’t I? My story will end up with lots of lovely little facts to build the theme and belief of that crime, and all my readers will see the fruit of my months of research, won’t they?

Well, I hope not.

I hope that I research to get an understanding, but that it doesn’t show in the book itself. I hope that I don’t just stick in so much detail that it reads like I’ve done lots of research. I hope my research doesn’t show at the seams, that it forms a plausible background, but doesn’t take over the story. My research should never be showing, it’s like a woman’s petticoats in the older days where we did wear them (I can just remember). It’s something private.

So that’s the answer to this question – yes, how much to research depends on many factors, including what your knowledge of the subject is already, how you are going to research, and how much detail you do need to provide. But in front of house, only enough is good enough. Stop as soon as you have the answer. In fact, stop as soon as you know where you can get the answer, and get on with the writing when it feels time. If you find you have holes in your knowledge when writing a certain passage or scene, then note it down, and add it to your research / question pile for a later date.

5. Pouring Out the Brew

So, you’ve stopped steeping, and stopped researching, right? Right? Okay, maybe you still have a bit, but not too much. Maybe use the additional research as an incentive or reward system. Write 2000 words, then do a half hour of research at the end of the session…

Now it’s time to get into the writing – whether you are a structionist who likes to outline a plot to the scene by scene level, or somebody who likes to wing it with a few idea cards. But of importance, stop researching and start pouring out your findings into some actual written fictional work. Oh, and stop to have a real cup of tea.

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