“But, I’m writing fiction!” you might say. “I don’t need to do a lot of research.” Unfortunately, there are virtually no scenarios where doing a bit of research would not help. For example, do any of your characters use weapons like guns? What do you know about guns? Have you ever actually loaded or fired one? If not, you might want to at least verify that your character using a Winchester Model 1873 carbine can have up to fifteen .44-40 center fire cartridges in the tube magazine.
Excellent post by Amy.
I'm a huge fan of researching, WHILE you're writing. Writing comes first for me, because research is so seductive that I can happily spend months researching. And sadly, never write the book.
(Sigh. I've done that more than once. I felt so productive -- until I figured out no writing was happening.)
