RESEARCH: A CRITICAL PART OF WRITING. BUT NO ONE SAYS IT HAS TO BE BORING! By Michael Rigg

Harriet Robin 
New Orleans School of Cooking 

Any fiction writer worth their salt will acknowledge that research is a key component of our craft. We write stories that, in the long run, are not entirely true. That’s why it’s called fiction. We ask our readers to suspend belief, at least while they read what we write, and pray they will accept our premise: “what if…” But to engage the reader, to keep them turning pages, our fiction must be plausible.

In sum, fiction—the ultimate untruth—must, of necessity, be based in truth, and supported by facts. Our written untruth must be believable. Thorough research is how we attain this believable untruth. Research is the lifeblood of good fiction. If it doesn’t ring true, the reader will soon be bored and more likely to put our novel down and, worse, add us to their “do not read” list.