Sometimes it can be hard to write about a city you’ve never been in.

I recently realized that whenever I have to set one of my stories in a big city, I choose Chicago, IL. Because I’ve been there several times, I was unknowingly using that as a crutch to avoid having to do the work to get to know another city.

That shouldn’t be.

I set one of the main location settings in my novel Embers in Chicago. Well, Intelligent Jenna did not realize until at the end of her outlining that Chicago and Niobrara County, Wyoming (another main location setting) are over 16 hours apart.

*face palm*

No, wait…

*face smack*

It’s embarrassing. Go ahead, laugh at me. I can take it.

So, as you’ve probably realized, this posed a bit of a problem for the story. My characters could not go back and forth easily between these two important locations, traveling over 16 hours.

So…some researching was in order. I had to choose a better location. I ended up settling on Rapid City, South Dakota.

And I’ve never been there.

But hey. Enough about me and my story and my mistakes. I’m going to give you some tips on researching cities you’ve never been to. We all know the importance of making a setting come to life for the reader, and you can’t do that if you don’t know enough about it.

So here are some crucial researching tips so ensure that you know as much as you can about your setting.

Be sure to research…

01. The architecture

Super important, obviously. You want to be able to describe the surroundings and feel of the area. The size of the buildings, creativity of the architecture, etc.

02. Businesses

What kind of businesses congregate in this area? Is this location known for any particular foods, restaurant or attraction?

03. Population

Small town or big city? The population effects the feels and the things your characters will encounter.

04. Climate and wildlife

Research the unique weather for your location. And be sure to look at the average temperature for the time of year your story is set in.

And this might not be really important for your story, but take a little time to research about the wildlife, animals, insects, plants, etc. for your setting.

05. How the people talk

It’s weird, but different areas of the our good ol’ USA have different accents and phrases they say. You don’t have to go overboard in your story using a bunch of the native phrases, but you want to be accurate. People who live or have been in your setting will know if you do it right or wrong.

A couple other tips…

|Use Google’s Street View feature|

This little tool is awesome! It helps a lot for getting the feel of a city by just “walking” around and observing. Familiarize yourself with the streets and space and architecture.

|Create a collage|

People don’t often make collages or aesthetics for settings (especially in contemporary fiction). This will help you get a good feel of the setting and help refresh your memory before writing.

Of course, another great thing is to talk to people that live in or have visited your setting. But that can be difficult.

I hope these little tips will help you in your research! I hope you learned from my mistake as well. 😛

The Writer to Author blog series…

I was inspired recently to start a blog series about changing our mindset about writing. About treating it like a business and setting ourselves up for success in the publishing world. I’ve already prepared some content (things like starting an author website, social media marketing, etc.), but I need your input. I want to know what you want to learn. So, if you would, just click on the link below to add your input on this new series. I can’t wait to receive your feedback! 🙂

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Another quick note: this blog series will be accessible by password only. Email subscribers automatically get sent the access code (NOT WordPress Reader subscribers). So If you’re excited about this series and want to gain access, then CLICK HERE to get the password!

NaNoWriMo Update no. 1

11/1/19-11/6/19

This first week felt really good! I am ahead of schedule! The NaNo site predicted that at my current rate, I would reach 50k by November 23rd. 🙂 Now of course, the coming weeks will most likely be more difficult, but it feels good. I’m having so much fun with writing Embers. It feels like I’ve been outlining this thing for months…wait…I have. XD Anyway, my MC is already miserable and hates me (but I love her still 😉 ).

Words written this week: 13,171

Total word count: …13,171

Now, I want to hear ALL ABOUT how your writing is going! <3 Are your characters behaving? How much are you loving your story? What’s the genre? If you haven’t already, feel free to send me a buddy invite! Happy writing, friends!

How do you research places you’ve never been? What’s a place you’d love to visit (real or fictional)? How is your NaNo going so far?

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