by Ruth Harris
How often should you water a cactus?
What is the name of the president who came before Abraham Lincoln?
How do you blow up a bridge?
What’s so special about the Sydney opera house?
What does SPECTRE stand for?
In the course of writing a novel, a writer — one who will never indulge in an info dump — will need to find the answers to all sorts of oddball questions, some of them basic, others esoteric, all of them critical.
He or she will also need to know enough about Siberian weather patterns, the career paths of math professors, oil drilling techniques, and the training of dancing horses called dressage to create credible settings and write authentic sounding dialogue.
Explore beneath the surface to find the pearl that will make your book stand out from the crowd: the right research, properly used, can make all the difference.
Reference.
A dictionary on steroids, WordHippo tells you the meaning of a word and also finds synonyms, antonyms, rhyming words, sentences to demonstrate usage, and more. Type in the word you are looking for, choose the appropriate category and WordHippo will come up with the results, as well as offer one-click links to other data for the word.
You’re feeling blah? Your sentences ditto? Does your writing need more ooomph? Kathy Steinemann’s word lists and redundancy quizes ride to the rescue.
The reverse dictionary is another approach to curing the blahs. Enter a word, phrase, description, or pattern to find related words.
Streetwise slang? Naughty words? Here’s a guide to current lingo: urban dictionary
An etymological dictionary explores the history of words, when they first came into usage, and how they came to mean what they do. Writers of historical fiction will find an etymological dictionary indispensable. Here’s a handy online version.
Be sure to keep your own reference files or database. I make note of names that appeal (or don’t cuz you never know) and oddball facts I come across. These lists come in very handy when I’m stuck for a name for a character or simply need a jump start out of the same-old-same-old.
Research.
Google and Wikipedia and YouTube are the go-tos but there are many other sites (just about all of them FREE) that will answer your questions.
Even better, they will give you answers to the questions you didn’t even think to ask or trigger a plot point even better than the one you already have.
Here is a brief round up of sites I have found indispensable for research including several that aren’t usually thought of as reference sources.
The New York Times maintains a massive searchable archive where you can search by author, section, or time periods from the past 24 hours, the past year or by specific dates.
The Washington Post also maintains a large searchable archive.
USAToday, New York’s Daily News and the BBC also offer valuable search options.
Time magazine’s archive extends from 1923 to 2014 and includes the weekly’s covers for a visual look at what made the headlines week by week during most of the 20th Century and much of the 21st.
If you need a clue about what your characters are or were wearing, Vogue can help.
Beauty and style influencers on Instagram offer the latest and greatest tips for makeup and grooming.
Don’t forget that on-line catalogues from shops like LL Bean and Nieman-Marcus will help you dress (and or undress) your characters.
Need to jog your memory about movies or TV? IMDB and/or Rotten Tomatoes have the deets.
The dish on celebs? All over the web. Just pick your fave.
Looking for inspirational human-interest stories? What about the scoop on The Sexiest Man Alive? People is the place to go.
And not to forget: James Bond trivia.
Resources.
Want to ask an expert? Or get the low down from someone who’s been there, done that?
Sign up with Quora where you can choose from over 400,000 topics to create a feed of information tuned to your interests.
Reddit has communities devoted to just about any subject you can think of.
Need the perfect hashtag for your tweet or post? Try Dave Chesson’s hashtag generator.
For who retired, who unretired, who got traded and who just signed a $$$$ contract in the locker room and on the gridiron, the skating rink, the baseball diamond or the tennis court, ESPN and/or The Athletic will clue you in.
Writing for a younger demo? TikTok is the place to go.
Pinterest, eBay and Etsy are usually not considered research sites but they are gold mines of ideas presented visually and, in the case of eBay and Etsy, items described in detail — a big help when you don’t know exactly what this or that doodad, knicknack or collectible is called.
All three sites also come in handy when you’re looking for inspiration for a character’s hobby, business or side hustle.
Bios and Names
Need a name for a Catalan or Chinese character? Want a name for a hillbilly, a witch, a rapper? A name with ancient Celtic, Biblical or literary allusions? Try this name generator.
Offering a huge searchable database covering everything from demographic data to international affairs and global religious beliefs, many consider Pew research the Big Daddy of info.
Seeking a “fact checker” for the internet?” Check out ref desk: http://www.refdesk.com/index.html
Hung up for a famous or funny movie quote? Here are 150 of them.
Consult Oxford dictionaries in a variety of languages including: British English, American English, German, French, and Spanish.
The Oxford biographical dictionary contains bios of almost 60,000 people, English and beyond.
Setting your story during a particular day in a certain year? Get the scoop on what happened on that day here: http://news.bbc.co.uk/onthisday/default.stm
Art and Design
Need to brush up on the history of graphic design? Poke around here.
Contemporary art? Try MOMA in New York City at http://www.moma.org or the Metropolitan Museum. In San Francisco: http://www.sfmoma.org. Los Angeles: http://www.moca.org
Renaissance art? http://www.history.com/topics/renaissance-art
African art? http://africa.si.edu
Folk art? http://www.folkartmuseum.org
Science? Get information about Mind & Brain, Plants & Animals, Earth & Climate, Space & Time, Matter & Energy, Computers & Math, Fossils & Ruins here: http://www.sciencedaily.com
Health and medicine? Rely on the experts at the Mayo Clinic here: http://www.mayoclinic.com
Need more? Try the Smithsonian: http://www.smithsonianmag.com
The US Military has an extensive, searchable site that covers the wartime and peacetime activities of the army, navy, air force and marines.
Stuck? Out of ideas? Don’t even know what to look for next? Browse Mix for websites/photos/videos from across the web.
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Just about anything a writer wants to know or needs to find out is just a few keystrokes away. No more trips to the library. Or scrolling through hard-to-read microfiche. No more searching through heavy tomes to find that single, amazing, one-of-a-kind piece of information you absolutely, positively need to know.
Now!
by Ruth Harris (@RuthHarrisBooks) March 27, 2022
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What about you, scriveners? Did you know about all these resources and databases? How much time do you spend on research before you start a novel? Or do you wait and do the research as the story requiers?
BOOK OF THE WEEK
HUSBANDS AND LOVERS (Park Avenue Series, Book #2)—The Married Woman—Once a shy wallflower, Carlys Webber marries multimillionaire Kirk Arnold. When Kirk changes from a loving husband to an angry stranger, will Carlys risk her precious marriage for a few moments of stolen passion with the irresistibly handsome and sensuous architect, George Kouras?
The Single Woman—Fashion world superstar, Jade Mullen survives deception and divorce. She vows never to be betrayed again but what will she do when her devoted lover, architect George Kouras, asks her the one question she doesn’t want to answer?
The Husband—Kirk Arnold struggles to forget the dark secrets of his tormented past. He achieves one dazzling success after another but will he succumb to the tragedy that destroyed his family and will Carlys pay the price?
The Lover—George Kouras rises from humble beginnings to the top of his profession. He and Jade fall madly in love and think they have discovered a new way to live happily ever after, but what will she do when she finds out about George and Carlys?
Set in the glittering world of fashion and in high-powered executive suites, in run-down houses, ethnic neighborhoods and sedate suburbs, Husbands and Lovers is about men and women losing—and finding themselves—in the gritty 1970s and glitzy 1980s. “Steamy and fast-paced, you will be spellbound.”–Cosmopolitan
Available from All the Amazons Nook Kobo Google Play
There are some valuable resources online. You have listed quite a few, BUT I have to strongly disagree that *everything* you need is online. There are certain genres of fiction, Historical Fiction being one, where is it absolutely necessary if you want to write it well where it is necessary to go beyond ‘online’. And reading ones that don’t do more serious research, the lack of real research sticks out like that proverbial sore thumb. I recently read part of such a novel by a quite well-known historical fiction author that I returned to Amazon half-way through and emailed him asking quite irately, ‘DID YOU DO ANY RESEARCH AT ALL BECAUSE EVERYTHING YOU WROTE IS WRONG’. He lost a reader – permanently.
JR—Thanks. Guess I should have said “almost” everything. Oooops.
Wow. A veritable treasure trove (sorry about the cliche) of writerly resources. Thanks. And as a word dude, I’m very pleased to see Etymonline included.
CS—Thanks. Always happy to please. 🙂
Huge list of resources!
Those are the best two places for movie information. JoBlo also has a ton of articles and details.
The reader doesn’t have to know most of it, but the writer definitely needs to know.
Thanks, Alex. Didn’t know about JoBlo so thanks for adding.
Thank you for the list of resources. I’ve saved it for future reference. For my current work-in-progress, my go-tos are the Library of Congress, Internet Archive, and newspapers.com. At some point, I am going to have to dig into physical library archives.
Liz—Thanks. Your go-tos sound right on target & physical library archives are irreplaceable (and invaluable).
ooooh – I wrote down several of these because I will start writing my next book in about a month and I always come up with questions that your suggested sites could answer! Oh, yeah! Thank you so much, Ruth.
Patricia—Thanks. Hope some of these sites will answer your questions. Good luck with your new book!
Thank you, Ruth, for all those resources.
Rosemary—Thanks. Hope some of these resources will help lead you to the answers you need!
This great list of resources with links just made historical fiction a bit easier. I will add a plug for local historical societies, too. Sometimes it is worth getting away from the screen and sifting through the real thing, plus you help local historians preserve regional items and stories.
Carmen—Thanks. Thanks, too, for suggesting local historical societies. They are soooo helpful and local historians are so generous with their help. They are treasures!
Bookmarking these great resources, Ruth. Thanks!
Let me add one more historical source. $15/year provides access to 200 years worth of Saturday Evening Post archives. Fun place to search for period ads for everything from fashion to automobiles to home decor to food. Also news articles reflect the prevailing wisdom of the era. One can get lost for hours.
Debbie—thanks! Thanks,too, for adding that blast from the past. As you point out, Sat Eve Post’s a great way to research everyday items encyclopedias tend to overlook!
Thanks for the great list, Ruth. I’m bookmarking this one.
Kay—thanks. Hope you find some valuable links!
This is a wonderful list. Thank you so much. I practically live on the chronicling America site which gives free access to vintage newspapers.
Kirstie—thank *you* for your kind words. Thanks, too, for adding chronically America to our list of resources. Appreciated!
I haven’t heard of the majority of those you’ve listed, but have used Google as a starting point and the public library back in the day.
May I suggest another great use of public libraries and town/state historical societies?
If you have access to an actual open public library or even a larger historical society, check to see if they access to microfilm and newspaper digital databases. For better or worse, my first state job was working on a long term project called “The Connecticut Newspaper Project”, in which old CT newspapers were catalog and microfilmed (note, a lot of states did this as well, so check with your state library or National Endowment for the Humanities for further info).
Microfilm is a treasure trove of information, especially locally. Using CT as an example, they microfilmed with over 150+ local weekly and daily newspapers, so they have, in some instances, 150+ years of a typical large daily run. Great way to see how the world changed from decade to decade and from century to century, as well as seeing how things like reporting and advertising has changed too.
GB, hope some of these will help. Am I correct thinking you’re referring to microfiche? I remember running them thru their machine so you could find what you were looking for. Such valuable info for all the reasons you cite. Thanks for adding to our list of resources for writers!
No, microfilm. I don’t think microfiche is used that much anymore, and you’re very welcome.
Good stuff, Ruth! (And a nod to Anne.) I’ll share a handy resource-finding link if you’ll let me. I spent a few years writing web content full-time for my daughter’s agency. When I was assigned a topic, I’d Google it and put PDF at the end. That tells Google to head straight to the authoritative papers rather than shuffling through Ads and Buzzfeed click-bait. For example – “hazards of being a lion tamer pdf” gives you excellent resources, that is if you’re into taming lions. Also, Google has a feature called DeepSearch but I’ve never used it.
Garry—Thanks. Also thanks for the great tip. New to me and most welcome! (I’ve never tried DeepSearch either. So far, a shallow search has gotten me what I needed. lol)
Wow! This is about the most useful post I’ve ever come across. All these are going in a little book (cos I’ll lose the post, even if I put it in favourites!)
Thank you so much.
VM—Wow! Thanks! 🙂
Hope some of these links will help. Also, links always lead to other links, so it’s a win-win!
Great list, Ruth!
I can get lost in Quora for HOURS. The psychopath section is highly entertaining and educational. Don’t forget the Library of Congress for old newspaper clippings. Also, many universities like Harvard have searchable databases.
Sue—Thanks! Great suggestions, too. There are so many research options beyond Google that are super-helpful to writers. Thanks for adding!
You caught me at a moment when I was feeling particularly irate about poor research by an author I used to enjoy. So some genres require more in depth research that others but let me repeat that you give some very valuable research sources whether they are all one might need or not.
JR—Thanks for the kind words. Appreciated!
Thanks for this! What a gold mine! I agree that libraries and historical centers are also great resources, but these are great, too. I’ve bookmarked a few of these. What I need right now, though, is a squirrel encyclopedia, with color photos. It’s got to be out there somewhere!
I only used some of them. Though I’m surprised that TVTropes is not here.
Still, a great list. Many thanks!
Thank you so much for the links
Perfect fact-gathering post! I’ve bookmarked it and shared it online. Thanks so much.