Setting the Record Straight
Much of the fun of writing a novel, for myself at least, is doing the research. I have a passion for history and I especially love discovering odd facts (did you know, for example, that Mata Hari’s real name was Margaretha Geertruida Zelle and that she was executed for espionage in World War I?). And I am always eager to share these nifty discoveries with everyone, which is why I am a stickler for accuracy.
Every time I write a novel, I go over my facts with a fine-toothed comb to make sure I haven’t let any errors slip into the story. My back-ups are wonderful: my editor and then the copyeditor, whose job it is to question facts. Once the manuscript has gone through all that scrutiny, a reader can be fairly certain of the information that spices my stories.
Imagine my surprise, therefore, to learn of a questionable fact in my book, The Dreaming. The story opens with our heroine Joanna on a steamship bound for Australia. The ship is becalmed on the sea and sailors have to tow her by rowing longboats hitched to the ship by ropes. I borrowed the incident from a journal written in the 1870’s by a young woman who traveled alone from India to Australia. The journal was so fascinating (loaned to me by the young lady’s descendants who currently live in Melbourne) that it did not occur to me to wonder how a steamship could be becalmed. It also did not occur to my editor at Random House, nor to the copyeditor whose job it was to spot questionable details. However, I have since heard from readers asking how a steamship gets becalmed. The question is a good one, and it was never explained in the Victorian journal. Did they run out of fuel? Was there engine trouble? It was something I should have questioned myself, but I did not and so what might be an error found its way into my book. (I have since learned that early steamships often ran out of fuel and the crews resorted to burning furniture and even cabins to keep them going.)
I always double-check important facts, especially material I obtain through personal interviews because sometimes memory can be faulty. A family of Scottish heritage living in Melbourne, Australia, for example, proudly told me their family motto, and I had decided to include it in my book. Luckily I did follow-up research and found that the motto belongs to another clan entirely!
Another example is found in my book, Virgins of Paradise. When King Farouk abdicates, I place a young Anwar Sadat with him alone in the royal palace. I subsequently heard from a reader who insisted this was not correct, that it was her uncle who was alone with King Farouk during the famous abdication. Be that as it may, my source was Jihan Sadat’s autobiography, and she said that it was her husband Anwar who witnessed the abdication.
The only other error that has been pointed out to me is also in Virgins of Paradise. Apparently I accidentally left the nuts out of a dessert recipe. But that’s a blog for another time.
Image Source: www.nuthealth.org
