Writing a Novel: Call the Vet!

The heart of any novel is the research, which is why so many cling to the old adage “write what you know.”

It’s smart, of course, to write out of your own experience–you can draw on your reactions, you know what things sound, taste and smell like, you have an innate understanding of the underlying elements of your tale.

But what if you’re writing about something you don’t know a lot about? What if you can’t avoid it because your hero has to have an occupation that makes sense, even if you’re not an expert?

I ran into that problem while writing An Inconvenient Gamble. My hero, Charles Moss, was a prisoner of war during the War Between the States. He spent time at Fort Delaware prison camp in the middle of the Pea River. A native of Lexington, Kentucky, he got caught in a bad bet which reformed his gambling instinct.

I needed to add gambling components to his back story and his life. He was from Lexington, the horse racing capital of America.

Well, that was easy.

He grew up on a horse farm.

My heroine, Jenny Duncan, lived and now owned a horse ranch in Texas. I just had to figure out the rest of the story.

I knew I wanted the couple to connect through the horses and thought an emotional scene involving a horse giving birth would add to the story. But I don’t know much about horses. Who could help me?

Who indeed? My niece Maura is a large animal veterinarian in Idaho. She works with horses and cows all the time!

I sent an email asking questions and she responded with a lengthy reply providing numerous ways horses could die in horse-birth. She also listed a number of other brutal events she had observed in her practice.

I didn’t want the horse to die, I just wanted a little drama. Since our heroine was pregnant, I thought a pregnant horse would do the trick.

“Normally if we leave them alone, horses do fine,” she said.

“But what about all those stories you tell about needing chains and leverage to midwife calves?”

“Oh, cows are a different story.”

I described the events of An Inconvenient Gamble to the vet and asked for an opinion. She dismissed my plot point immediately.

“No horseman in his right mind would plan for a foal to be born in December. That’s the very last month you want your horse to be born.”

“What if it was an accident? You know, an unexpected pregnancy.”

“Anyone who knows anything would laugh at you.”

Maura then provided a primer of sorts to equine obstetrics. My great scene just wasn’t going to work. I asked more questions and finally ended up with “what about cows? When do they give birth?”

She laughed. “Cows can give birth any time.”

I changed the story.

But I still needed sensory descriptions for the experience, though I didn’t want to gross out the reader.

Those of you familiar with medical professionals will understand how they enjoy going into detail. Maura pointed out maggots can be very effective in cleaning out wounds.

I’ve spared you, Reader.

Maura also talked about how to make a newborn calf sneeze–which forces the calf to breathe. That made it into the story. She talked about other technical things I needed to understand to provide verisimilitude to my tale.

And, I learned what to expect when I come across a cow with its tail sticking straight out.

You’ll have to read the story to find out. But, beware.

How important is it to you the research be complete when you read an historical novel? How much medical detail do you like in a story?  🙂

Tweetables:

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(Birthing is imminent)