Do you do research?

I'll do minor research while writing all the time, but this is mostly fact checking which can be resolved with a quick internet search. Otherwise I try to stick to writing about things I'm reasonably familiar with and settings that could be "almost anywhere" in nature.

"Crash Into Me" is the exception. One of the main characters in the story is an amputee who lost part of her leg as the result of a car accident. This is something that I have no experience with in the real world, and I knew if I half-assed it or made stuff up, I'd get comments from people who are familiar with the subject calling me out on it. I spent several months reading internet forums, blog posts, and guidelines for both pre- and post-operative care. I followed a woman on YouTube who had her leg crushed in an accident and opted for amputation simply to relieve the pain, and was vlogging about the experience both before and after. I researched and read up on prosthetics, what they could do and what they couldn't, the way they were applied and removed, fittings, and measurements.

I also watched a video of the amputation procedure itself (sometimes through the gaps in my fingers, because holy shit a lifetime of enjoying horror films just cannot prepare you for some things). I did not eat for the rest of the day.

The story does not include any graphic details of the injury or the operation, but I felt it important, as a writer, to understand just exactly what I was about to do to poor Lynn. But beyond the procedure itself, I wanted to hear the voices of those who had gone through it, and see how they adapted to life afterwards. In the end, I'm extremely proud of the story, and have received comments and PMs from both doctors and patients alike who've said their experiences were very similar to Lynn's. I didn't get everything perfect, I know, but I got close enough that people with first-hand experience didn't flame me for ignorance. :)
 
In the end, I'm extremely proud of the story, and have received comments and PMs from both doctors and patients alike who've said their experiences were very similar to Lynn's. I didn't get everything perfect, I know, but I got close enough that people with first-hand experience didn't flame me for ignorance. :)

I've had a similar reaction to my character Amelia in

https://www.literotica.com/s/rope-and-veil

who I portrayed as a woman with paraplegia - when I received comments like the ones below, it is with both pride and humility.

Gorgeous
by Anonymous user on 03/11/2016
I am a wheelchair user. You have a great sense of what it means. She is beautifully seen, strong and vulnerable. I have never thought to include my disability in my writing, but you inspire me to. I will write and post. Thank you.

good to read disability does not interfere with love
by Anonymous user on 07/22/2016
Years ago due to cancer I had one of my breasts amputated at a young age and I then thought that this will make me very unattractive to men. So this story is a very moving one as it shows that when there is love there is always a way.
 
I've had exactly that sort of feedback from bikers an 1% bikers on my " Chinese Takeout" series. It is very gratifying isn't it.
 
I'll do minor research while writing all the time, but this is mostly fact checking which can be resolved with a quick internet search. Otherwise I try to stick to writing about things I'm reasonably familiar with and settings that could be "almost anywhere" in nature.

"Crash Into Me" is the exception. One of the main characters in the story is an amputee who lost part of her leg as the result of a car accident. This is something that I have no experience with in the real world, and I knew if I half-assed it or made stuff up, I'd get comments from people who are familiar with the subject calling me out on it. I spent several months reading internet forums, blog posts, and guidelines for both pre- and post-operative care. I followed a woman on YouTube who had her leg crushed in an accident and opted for amputation simply to relieve the pain, and was vlogging about the experience both before and after. I researched and read up on prosthetics, what they could do and what they couldn't, the way they were applied and removed, fittings, and measurements.

I also watched a video of the amputation procedure itself (sometimes through the gaps in my fingers, because holy shit a lifetime of enjoying horror films just cannot prepare you for some things). I did not eat for the rest of the day.

The story does not include any graphic details of the injury or the operation, but I felt it important, as a writer, to understand just exactly what I was about to do to poor Lynn. But beyond the procedure itself, I wanted to hear the voices of those who had gone through it, and see how they adapted to life afterwards. In the end, I'm extremely proud of the story, and have received comments and PMs from both doctors and patients alike who've said their experiences were very similar to Lynn's. I didn't get everything perfect, I know, but I got close enough that people with first-hand experience didn't flame me for ignorance. :)

I've had to do similar research for the story I have nearly finished, a comedy/drama set in the early 1960s where the lead character was stricken with polio as a child 10 years previously and has to wear a brace on her leg. Hopefully I have done a good job, and readers will react well to the character.

Because most of my stories are set in the past, some many years before I was born, I have to do plenty of research when writing them.
 
I try to write from personal knowledge, but i find even that requires some additional research. I work in health care, and before my husband died I did hemodialysis for him at home. So in one of my novels, the protagonist is a nephrologist. Now, I can fake this up to a certain extent but not completely. Especially when I make one of her lovers an orthopedic surgeon. So I do some research and then don't get into too much detail, because the story is about them more than it is about their work but I still have to make it believable. There's also a Presidential campaign happening that figures in the plot, so I have to coordinate the state primary dates with the right time of year and the pace of events. In one story, I blithely made some woman's dog an older Rottweiler who'd been trained to attack on command so then I had to look up how that all works, and some of the commands. I managed to work him into one section, because after the mentions of him being a trained attack dog I felt obligated to let him show his stuff to justify that whole line of conversation. So, yeah, I do research and it's fun, and I always end up learning something interesting.
 
I should do that too. Lol

Jeanne's not the only one to ask. Most of my PMs are from people asking about research information.

It's the same for the real me. Currently I'm working on research for our local museum and the historical records society. Both will impede my NaNoWriMo activities.
 
I like historical (or geographical) settings, so a little research sets the story. It would be daft to have people snow-skiing on a Mediterranean island during the Roman era.

I have a WW2 story on the back-burner and some of the weaponry needed to be vaguely appropriate to the era, it came as some surprise to find that something that I envisaged common wasn't introduced until after D-Day, so would never have been available before that.

It's a simple matter to find when Mustangs, Liberators, Flying Fortresses etc were introduced or discontinued and saves snarky comments from people happy to share their geekyness.

Like spelling mistakes and random exclamation marks, such things break the concentration of the reader.
 
Depends upon the story. Most of the time, my research is limited to quick Google searches. I just looked up information on North American owls, trying to find one that could reasonably be somewhere, but which would be rare enough in the region to be an inciting factor for the story.

In some cases, I may take deep dives. Most of my Laresa stories as Dark had a lot of research behind them related to the locations, the era, and speech patterns of same.

Usually, it's something related to the plot, though. I tend to stick to imaginary towns that are never named, and may not even give more than vague hints about the region beyond it obviously being America.
 
Research can be fun, especially if you write comedic stories, which I do.

For example in one of my stories, Bridget the Bossy Bridezilla, an absolute loser makes a huge faux pas with the titular character's infertile older sister who is depressed over her inability to conceive.

I have no experience with infertility myself, so went to parenting pages and sites such as YouTube to look up the worst things to say to infertile people, and was amazed at some of the things said and how tactless they were. I put a lot of these into the story, with the loser offering well-intentioned advice such as 'At least you don't have cancer, it's not the end of the world being barren or sterile', 'Maybe God has decided you just aren't meant to have children?' and 'I bet your sister is super fertile and will have lots of kids to make up for you.'
 
...readers will notice if you have your characters leaving San Francisco by car and arriving in Los Angeles three hours later.
I've done that. As a passenger. In the souped-up personal Olds Toronado of a deputy director of the highway patrol. Because my brother, police chief of a notable Angeleno city, needed to see me RIGHT AWAY and the CHP had no air assets available. So yes, it happens.

If I were actually getting paid for it, or trying to establish a literary reputation for historical fiction, I'm sure I'd be more diligent about it.
We may note that big blockbuster novels often credit many researchers, some paid. Some 'researchers' are essentially ghostwriters. The 'author' spins the plot and lets the minions fill in the details. Hey, it's bizness!
 
I research the hell out of everything, and practice moves that I think will work, but have to test for realism. I don't do much, if any, research for the porn I put up on Lit.
 
I often write about fantasy or historical settings, so I do a lot of fact checking and research. If I'm basing a story on a poem, myth, fairy tale, etc..., then I will read the original. I also do a lot of writing about erotic hypnosis, so going into trance myself constitutes research. The difference between writing about something you've actually read/experienced and writing based on a story you haven't read or an experience you've never had cannot be overstated. So I do a lot of research, and most of it is fun.
 
Some. Depends on the story. Usually the idea comes to me, if any technical details come up, I check it out. Likewise if I'm using a real location, I check that out as well. Otherwise no.

I am working on a few non erotic stories, and and have done a lot of research on them. Ditto for a Nano story I did some years ago set in the mid 1500's.

So, quick answer: depends.
 
I write some stuff off of this website that requires a fair bit of research, but for these stories, there isn't much I have to look up. I try to write stories focused on people rather than places or things, so there aren't many facts I have to check. The only thing I can remember researching for one of the stories for this website is lactation, and that didn't require more than fifteen, twenty minutes.
 
It doesn't happen all that often that the story takes me in a direction where I feel like I need to do research; often, I write about subjects I'm reasonably knowledgeable about. But every now and then, some research becomes necessary. And it can be fun!

Here's me trying to decide what car one of my characters should drive. Currently, I'm looking into workout programs with the help of some nice folks on a fitness forum, to decide how the workout routine of one of my characters might look like.

The funny thing is, all that research usually barely shows up in the final text. That car mentioned above shows up in exactly one sentence. But I feel like getting the details right matters. I don't know, I feel like the reader can somehow sense whether the author put some work and care into it, or whether they're just being sloppy.
 
The funny thing is, all that research usually barely shows up in the final text. That car mentioned above shows up in exactly one sentence. But I feel like getting the details right matters. I don't know, I feel like the reader can somehow sense whether the author put some work and care into it, or whether they're just being sloppy.

My most-researched story contains quite of bit of the research, because the research was about the setting more than anything else.

Otherwise, I also end up putting gobs of research into one line. The rest goes into character backstories and the like. It helps me understand the characters and the story but it doesn't show up in the text.

I researched antique pianos off and on for years before writing the story that uses one. I don't think any reader would actually recognize the research.
 
Is firsthand experience the same as research? Quite a few of my stories are based on real-life experiences. One story, My Sister the Christmas Cruise Slut required a lot of research about cruise ships. I've never been on a cruise. I have little interest in the idea, but it felt like a good setting for a story with a higher rating than it probably deserves.
 
Oh I love to research. Getting into the nitty gritty details of the scene or topic really helps me imagine myself in my characters’ shoes. I could waste too much time in that pleasant daydream and barely get a few sentences typed.

Also I could help with Yosemite details if you need. I am quite familiar with the valley and high country there. And it is a beautiful backdrop hot a sexy story.
 
Just about all of my current crop of crap is set in the 1980s. Having lived through them, you'd think I'd have the timeline pretty well down. But, I find myself looking up things from that timeline to make sure they would have been out by the time setting I refer to them.

Just as an example, the thing I'm working on grinding into some level of submissability is a Turkey Tale from 1987. Some of the things I've felt it necessary to double check;

- The first international strong woman competition on Daytona Beach. (and a list of the winners)
- The release date for "Dirty Dancing".
- The Dallas Cowboy Thanksgiving Day football game for 1987. (Along with exactly when the strike ended and the "real" players took back over from the scabs.)
- The Top Pop charts to see where Bon Jovi's "Living on a Prayer" was ranked.
- The old Dallas Cowboys "Texas Stadium" and administrative office building in downtown Irving.

Just to name a few. Too many details, probably. But, I think making sure the setting is as accurate as possible lends a little more willingness to suspend disbelief when I work in the fictional elements.
 
Back
Top