I am obsessed with research. Well, I’m not obsessed in the sense that I love to research. No, I’m obsessed in the sense that once I’ve started researching, I can’t stop.
It’s a disease, I swear.
A few weeks ago, a Canadian writer friend and I brainstormed revisions for the single title I finished this summer. We came up with a fantastic way to deepen the heroine’s GMC. I passed the brainwave by another Canadian writer. She gave it glowing reviews.
This week I began researching. My first step was to post questions to a couple of writers’ listservs. I’m very glad I did, because the American members alerted me to a whole host of issues I hadn’t considered. On the other hand, their replies sent me back to the Land of Research. A land that, all too often in my case, develops into a bog. I experience a great deal of difficulty digging my way out. There’s just so damn much to learn! And if there’s one thing my mind loves, it’s information. Even the useless bits.
My characters in this story are American. I am not. And the revisions to my heroine’s GMC involve the American medical/health insurance system. Every time I think I’ve hit upon a way to make the brainwave work, I smash into another roadblock. Now, I do believe the revisions can work. They will work. If I would put half the energy into reading the articles I’ve printed off the Internet as I have into scrounging for them, I’m sure I would come across the perfect solution. But every time I read another article, I feel a compelling need to hit the Internet again. Just in case, you know, I missed something the first trillion times.
All I can say is, it’s a good thing I don’t write historicals.
Are you a research hound? Do you have binders filled with articles you’ll probably never use? Do you feel the need to read 30 news stories when 3 or 5 will probably do? How do you stop the madness?
Ha, you can’t stop this madness. It takes hold in your mind and becomes an obsession. However, long ago a teacher told me that this obsession is a sign of intelligence. LOL
I researched for weeks once, and hardly used any of it in the book. I think it was a subject I was a little afraid of, and research was my way of avoiding writing about it. Since then I’ve been able to control my research.
If you want to research the American health care system, turn on the news and you can listen to a bunch of people b*tch about it. lol Or maybe they aren’t flooding the Canadian airwaves with that…
Caroline, hi, thanks for stopping by.
I like your theory!
I had a very sleepless night last night, obsessed as I was with my research. But I’ve actually begun READING that research, and lo – ideas are starting to spring forth from the reluctant grey matter.
Being an information-hound is exhausting in more ways than one.
Edie, I hear you. Maybe I’ve overdosed on the research as a way to avoid the revisions. But I know in my heart that’s not true. Over-researching is and always has been part of my process. The Internet makes it worse. So much information!
As a kid, I used to collect…wait it for…pamphlets. Pamphlets about tires, tourism pamphlets, ANY sort of pamphlets about any sort of information. I had a dresser drawer full of pamphlets! I’ve always been this way. For some reason, I need to know a bunch of stuff I don’t need to know in order to discern between what is important for my purposes and what is not.
Avery, we get tons of information about the American health system on TV, because we get American TV through cable. But I wanted to make sure that I wasn’t presenting aspects only given through the news. I actually thought, from what I’ve seen on the news, that things are worse in the States than they might be. For example, I never really understood what Medicare or Medicaid was in the U.S. It was very important for me to research these because the secondary character I was making ill was over the age of 65. Now she’s under the age of 65, which works better for my story’s purposes.