Wednesday, March 14, 2018

Researching the 80s Can Be Totally Awesome!


From my essay up at the AWP Writer’s Notebook:

“I researched and wrote a novel set in 1900 Chicago, but what a cinch compared to writing about 1982 Chicago—though I was alive in 1982, with a brain actively recording memories. Some American eras beckon novelists seductively with auras of perpetual cool: Roaring Twenties. Grunge in the ’90s. The Sixties, everyone’s darling. Punk! Other historical times are lesser known, allowing the writer to do exactly what she wants: the 1200s. 1823. The Ice Age. But the time setting of my new novel, Silver Girl, is the late ’70s and the early ’80s, which I found was a challenging historical period to write about. (Yes, forty years ago is “historical fiction.”)…”

Read on to see my tips for how to handle modern historical research: