In this week’s guest post (’cause I’m still struggling with that pesky computer failure), author Norma Horton covers two topics dear to my heart: writing and exploring foreign countries. If you can call it research and write it off, so much the better!
Location, Location, Location
Today, I walked through Rome. Not in my mind (which I’ve been known to do), but in real life. Down the Spanish Steps, along the via Condotti, around the obelisk in the middle of the Piazza del Popolo. Whereas I used to stroll these streets as a tourist, I now walk as an author. Which means I walk with all my senses.
Fall is mushroom, truffle, and zucchini season. These aromas—especially the mighty truffle!—hang in the air from 2:00 p.m. until long after a late Italian supper. Coffee is in season year-round, so my morning cappuccino is inhaled as well as ingested. These scents are inextricably woven into the fabric of my days in Rome.
And the tastes! Yesterday, under awnings at a spot on the Via Bocca di Leone, I split a plate of fettuccine laced with freshly foraged mushrooms in a light cream sauce, generously topped with thinly sliced black truffle. The earthiness of the truffle, saltiness of the Pecorino cheese in the heavy cream, and mellow mushrooms were a culinary triumvirate. This wasn’t just a plate of pasta, it was a plate of details my readers would love.
Despite a reputation to the contrary, car horns aren’t the dominant sound in Rome. It’s bells. Church bells. They chime and peal throughout the day, and I’ve spent more than one serenade standing at the terrace door, smiling. Children race up and down the streets and alleyways, their footsteps and laughter humanizing this big city. Plates clatter and scooters zoom, tangling into the Roman symphony.
I feel rough square cobbles under my shoe soles, so unlike the rounded ones in Paris and Prague. I see the setting sun brightly illuminate “the wedding cake” (the Victor Emmanuel Monument) in a way so unlike the gray tones of a Parisian sunset on the Eiffel Tower.
The point is, good writing is about the characteristics that enable a reader to recreate a place in his or her mind. I argue that it’s an in-person experience for the writer, who can then sketch in shadows from Internet research. To be fair to my readers, I have to have “been there, done that” before I can accurately portray the Middle East or Western Europe or Peru. (I draw the line at shooting someone like my protagonist, archaeologist Grace Madison, did in When Camels Fly.)
The bond between writer and reader is one of trust. I trust them to buy my books, and they trust me to entertain them. I cede to Hemingway when he said to write about what you know, and write one true sentence, the truest you know. The intimacy I owe a reader starts here, in Rome.
NLB Horton returned to writing fiction after an award-winning career in journalism and marketing as well as earning her Master of Arts degree in Biblical Studies from Dallas Theological Seminary. From her home in the Rocky Mountains, she writes, cross-country skis, gardens, and researches ideas for her next novel.
Tweet: Traveling with my author’s hat on, I notice things that will show up in my novel.
Tweet: This wasn’t just a plate of pasta, it was a plate of details my readers would love.
Disclosure of Material Connection: I have not received any compensation for writing this post. I have no material connection to the brands, products, or services that I have mentioned. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255: “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.”