I do not have a specific topic for you today, alas. However! I love research, and it’s often fascinating to me to see where I’ve been (or had to revisit). I’ve often wished I kept better track of what I’ve had to research, so now here’s a list from me to you — at least for the past week. And, almost certainly, for future weeks (in separate posts, of course).
In the event you ever wondered where a writer’s research can take them, the Research Roundups make for an interesting browse. Or maybe you’ll find something you didn’t know you wanted more information on. Or possibly you just like playing detective, since I’m not labelling what the research was for. (Some of it is obvious. Some isn’t. Some might not even be for writing, or published works.)
You’ll notice many of these links are straight to wikipedia. When I’m just looking for a basic, easy recap, it’s usually the best place to start, if nothing else.
This week, the week of 28 May to 3 June, I researched:
New York City Hall — and the Manhattan Municipal Building (specifically its uses). In both cases I was looking into history, and what gets housed there (and when it started being so). At least one of those didn’t suit my purposes so I went ‘oy’ and creatively interpreted. As you can, when you’re writing alternate universes.
I also went looking into Albany, New York, and the New York Metropolitan Area. Let’s just say: distances. And whether Albany is in the Metropolitan Area or not. Nope, I’m not from the east coast of America.
Relatedly, I also went into Jimmy Walker and Fiorella La Guardia, mostly for the dates as to their terms (which I promptly decided to change anyway, but at least I know I’m doing it with intent). Of course, no foray into Beau James is complete without also looking at speakeasies (and their exact, uh, definitions) and the Prohibition. That led me to the Great Depression and World War 2 … again, I was looking at timelines and where I wanted to shove history off the rails. (I also mmaaay have forgotten the exact day of WW2’s start … but that’s what the internet is for, right?)
Not entirely related to New York State or the history thereof was the moon calendar in the United States for 2020. Really I just wanted some indication of whether characters would be looking at a full-ish moon or a waned one. Does it matter, for an alternate universe? Probably not. Did I want the foundation? Hell yes.
Leaving the United States, and on a dog-related front … sort-of … I went looking at tail language and kelpies. Okay, kelpies aren’t dog-related — but I couldn’t remember whether kelpies were strictly horses or had some dog-related myth to them. As is often the case, this was prelude to some more shoving-of-things-off-rails.
And speaking of myths, I also went looking for what kinds of titles the leader of a coven might hold. Possibly I looked at more pages than strictly necessary just for an answer to that question.
And, finally, I needed names, and went to my favourite name randomiser. No doubt I’l be back again — maybe I should keep track of how many times I use it.
Thus endeth this week’s quest through research hell; more like an easy jaunt, at least this time around. Tally-ho!
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