Hah, that commenter did miss the point by about a thousand miles, didn't they?
There's so much research you can do now on the internet, especially if you're writing a present-day setting. Google Earth has saved me from some howlers, and you can get a lot of local colour from local newspapers, I find, especially if you read the comments, including the horrific ones. One of my fics is set in the town I grew up in, actually behind my old school (I was thrilled when someone identified it in the comments even though I don't ever name names) and I had to go back and check that the stuff that was there fifteen years ago is still there now, and edit some bits. I've also just been writing a story set where I live, and there the problem I had was remembering to put the description in, because it was all so obvious to me. Doesn't everyone know what I mean when I mention going up a tor? So there are pitfalls of familiarity too.
But yeah, the tourist experience and the degree of knowledge you need about a place to write it convincingly are very different things. So much of writing a place convincingly is knowing its grammar, how the people there talk and how they refer to things and what they talk about and what they take for granted. If you speak the language, you can eavesdrop shamelessly on the bus - but eavesdropping around tourists isn't going to help you, and if you don't speak the language you're stuck. Writing an incomer/visitor (or time traveller!) can help with that problem, but presumably there are going to be some locals and they need to be convincing.
Tangentially, Mr P is now reading Time for Tea and is absolutely enthralled and says it's one of the best things he's read lately, and I think he's a bit in love with Olivia right now. Also he says you've got the right amount of sciency jargon about the time machine to not be annoying to a physicist :-).
no subject
There's so much research you can do now on the internet, especially if you're writing a present-day setting. Google Earth has saved me from some howlers, and you can get a lot of local colour from local newspapers, I find, especially if you read the comments, including the horrific ones. One of my fics is set in the town I grew up in, actually behind my old school (I was thrilled when someone identified it in the comments even though I don't ever name names) and I had to go back and check that the stuff that was there fifteen years ago is still there now, and edit some bits. I've also just been writing a story set where I live, and there the problem I had was remembering to put the description in, because it was all so obvious to me. Doesn't everyone know what I mean when I mention going up a tor? So there are pitfalls of familiarity too.
But yeah, the tourist experience and the degree of knowledge you need about a place to write it convincingly are very different things. So much of writing a place convincingly is knowing its grammar, how the people there talk and how they refer to things and what they talk about and what they take for granted. If you speak the language, you can eavesdrop shamelessly on the bus - but eavesdropping around tourists isn't going to help you, and if you don't speak the language you're stuck. Writing an incomer/visitor (or time traveller!) can help with that problem, but presumably there are going to be some locals and they need to be convincing.
Tangentially, Mr P is now reading Time for Tea and is absolutely enthralled and says it's one of the best things he's read lately, and I think he's a bit in love with Olivia right now. Also he says you've got the right amount of sciency jargon about the time machine to not be annoying to a physicist :-).