Location, location, location! by Ros Bayes

I have a confession to make. Up to now in my writing career I have got away without doing any on-location research. Now that’s not to say I haven’t done any research. I have fourteen published books so far and a fifteenth due out later this year, and I have put in many months of research. 

The A level textbooks have involved reviewing a great deal of the literature on the subject (Philosophy and Ethics), attending conferences addressed by current philosophers and ethicists and going back through the lecture notes I took while studying for my degree. 

The books on disability which I have written for my current employer, Through the Roof, have drawn on my own family’s experience of disability, but have also involved much study of secular and theological understanding of disability, and the lived experiences of disabled people, including designing surveys and collating the responses. 

The books which didn’t require this kind of research were my devotional writings which drew from my own journey with God, but also, of course, very extensively from the Bible. 

My novel based on John 4 entailed a great deal of study into that passage of Scripture, reading many commentators but also books on the history and customs of Samaria in the time of Jesus. I studied maps and measured distances between towns, I researched how far one could travel by donkey in a day over that terrain and I spent considerable time researching marriage customs of the day, and working out how it might have been possible to get through five husbands in that culture. 

The one thing I didn’t do was visit the region. I would have loved to have done so, but at the time the budget wouldn’t stretch to it. And in any case, the place now in its modern existence would have told me little about how it was in Jesus’ day, other than the contours of the terrain, which I could to some extent see through Google Earth, and the climate. 

But my current work in progress includes places which people now living will recognise, and it’s important that I get my facts right. I had heard that the area where my grandparents used to live in Hull had been earmarked for redevelopment but that little if any progress had been made. That suited my plot – I need a reason for a man whose work has been in the building trade to uproot his family and relocate. If he has been hanging on for an opportunity to work on the redevelopment, but no redevelopment has been forthcoming, he has a reason to relocate in search of work. 

I visited the area. I saw a desolate wasteland. The few houses still standing were boarded up and defaced with graffiti, and not of the artistic mural variety. The road where my grandparents had inhabited one of a row of neat, post-war pre-fabricated bungalows was nothing but a wilderness of weeds with, here and there, the remains of what must have been the concrete foundations of a building. 

I surveyed this with very mixed feelings. I remembered my last visit to my grandparents’ house, shortly before my grandfather died, to introduce them to my new husband. It was heartbreaking to see the devastation where their home had been. I sincerely hope the redevelopment will take place because it is prime land with masses of potential to be transformed into a welcoming and desirable residential area. But at the same time I was delighted that the scene before me fitted my plot so well, and I came home confident that I can keep that part of my story as I have written it knowing that it is congruous with the experience of those who live near the area. 

Next week I will be staying fairly close to the area to which, in my story, this family relocates. I have already written a considerable section of this part of the story, based on my memories of the place and Internet research – estate agents’ online advertisements and good old Google Earth again. I intend to spend a day walking around the area, seeing it for myself as it is now, getting a feel for the atmosphere, and checking the details of what I have written. 

As I explained, it’s the first time I’ve done this physical on-the-spot research and I’m rather enjoying it. It’s a good excuse for a day out, not to mention an opportunity to make use of my newly acquired senior railcard!

Ros Bayes has 10 published and 4 self-published books, as well as some 3 dozen magazine articles. She is the mother of 3 daughters, one of whom has multiple complex disabilities, and she currently works for Through the Roof (www.throughtheroof.org) as their Training Resources Developer, and loves getting paid to write about disability all day. You can find her blog at http://rosbunneywriting.wordpress.com and her author page at http://www.amazon.co.uk/Ros-Bayes/e/B00JLRTNVA/. Follow her on Twitter: @rosbwriting.