How author Margaret Pinard travels and researches locale (plus your chance to download her new book for free!)

28th February 2016

Here on TripFiction, I’m sure you’re more attuned to a novel’s setting than the average reader.
You know the places you like to visit, you know which authors portray them well. When your eye catches a false step, or your ear hears an anachronism, you groan and think: “Seriously, has this author even been to this country?”

But what about when you don’t notice those things? What makes you absorb the atmosphere of a time and place so effortlessly? Authors go to a lot of trouble to try to get these things exactly right.

When I travel for the purpose of book research, I notice the little things that differ from my own background (a California native): the inconveniences, the smells, the food customs, the weather, the turns of phrase. You know, the things you don’t pay attention to where you live because they’re second nature.

In Tony’s review for TripFiction of The Silent Room, for example, he points out that author Mari Hannah made these simple locations come alive with detail that he passed regularly: Newcastle Crown Court, and the iconic Tyne Bridge.
I want to see those things in my own hometown too, as a reader. And I want to show those details to my own readers. But I am not interested in writing about middle-class, white-bread, suburban California–pah!

I am fascinated by Scotland and other parts of the UK, so my research trips there are like scavenger hunts: I forage for treasure like a pirate in the South Seas, like a pig for truffles in the Perigord, like… well, you get the idea. And because I have the memory of a bunny rabbit, I have to document these things.

I take copious notes in slim, flexible notebooks that are easy to acquire and take up little space, and I take pictures, which take up no room at all.
So that last tourist you thought was daft for taking a picture of the gutter and the curb on a main shopping street? Might have been me. The obvious American snapping signage in the central square? Possibly me. That looney scrounching down to get a closeup of some moss? Definitely me.

On my last trip to Scotland, where The Keening is set, my time was very carefully planned to maximize observations. Here’s how this author planned a trip in order to get her setting as ‘on the nose’ as possible.

-Pick the places of interest (Mull, Barra, Uist)
-Check possibilities (Affordable? Region’s history?) to narrow down geographic area
-Decide mode of travel (car or public transport)
-Book airfare well in advance (6 months) and research locations of interest
-Pack as lightly as possible to allow for as much flexibility as possible (e.g. changing day trip destinations)
-Check whether booking accommodations is necessary, given remoteness, season, and special events
-Get all the logistical details amassed before departure (transport schedules–ferry, bus, train, opening times–museums, tourist info, special exhibit dates, availability of credit card facilities & ATMs) in a spreadsheet, as these things might trip you up later
-Keep a travel journal (paper or tablet, as long as you log all memorable/ interesting experiences as you travel)
-Take copious photos, to accompany above
-Carpe diem. Don’t forget selfies.
-Upon return, within one month, take a few marathon sessions to edit down your photos, and label all photos you keep, with help of journal
-Match photos to wherever you are in the writing process (writing/editing) for reference

Hopefully, at the end of all that, you’ve captured something that transcends all the details: that indefinable sense of place–the very sense of place that draws you in can be represented on the page with words, carefully chosen, perhaps even agonized over…
…so that readers can feel their own experience of place come alive in someone else’s imagination.

The Keening will be free for Kindle from 28 February  to 1 March 2016, so take advantage of the leap year to get a free book!

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