How to Research for Your Novel Without Getting Bogged Down: A New Method
Today I want to talk about something I do when I’m reading in order to research for a novel I’m writing. I’d never given a name to it before, but I came up with one for this episode. I’m calling it the marginalia method.
First I’ll tell you the why behind this method—that is, why I even do it at all. Then I’ll tell you how it works.
Why Every Novel Should Start with a Big Question
I teach that when you start a novel or memoir, you want to start with a Big Question. Your job isn’t to answer this question, but to explore it. As Chekhov famously stated, “The role of the artist is to ask questions, not answer them.”
So you can relieve yourself of the pressure of being some kind of guru. You don’t have to have figured everything out to be a great writer. You just have to be willing to entertain honest questions and brave enough to share the real, human struggle that those questions raise for us.
This method of asking a Big Question is vital to giving yourself an engine to get to or beyond the 70,000-word point. Stories that don’t have a big question tend to peter out. So the Big Question is an invaluable tool.
When Novel Research Becomes Overwhelming
But recently I was talking to a writer in my program about how, when you’re serious about the Big Question, it can be easy to get bogged down in the existential questions and possibilities while researching.
For example, in the novel I’m working on, I explore the line between performance and deception, so I bought some books on performance art. I also am writing about a multi-level marketing company in my story, and so I got a book on the history of multi-level marketing.
I loved reading these books; I always love going down rabbit holes of novel-research. It’s fun and thrilling, because learning is enjoyable in general, but especially when you’re doing it for a reason.
The problem is that, when you acquire a wealth of new knowledge about a particular subject relevant to the book you’re writing—whether it’s the stock market or watercolor painting or what the year 1912 was like—the scope of what is possible for you to tackle in your book can skyrocket.
I can get overwhelmed by possibility, or by the complexity and nuance of what I’ve learned, which can lead to me feeling unable to write at all. Because how can I possibly tackle everything I just learned about? How do I address all these layers?
Or, I’m not daunted, I’m excited, and I try. Even though it’s way more complicated and sophisticated than what my narrative needs, I think, well, I know all of this new information, maybe I should include it all so the reader trusts the narrator as an expert and can also enjoy learning everything I’ve learned!
There is still a problem in this second instance, though, which is that a novel that includes certain facts rarely needs to include an entire other book’s worth of details about those facts.
If you at all relate to these situations, which let’s call RESEARCH OVERWHELM and RESEARCH FANATICISM, keep reading, because I want to talk about a way to avoid both.
Introducing the Marginalia Method
Here we go—meet the marginalia method. Marginalia meaning the notes or scribbles in the margins of a book or other document.
As I’m reading a book for research and coming across cool things that might fit in my narrative, I jot what that idea is in the margin of the book. When I finish the book, I have anywhere from five to forty possible applications to my story—and they’re all bite-sized, because I was confined to the margin of the page.
These range from super small—an idea for a side-character’s name or a very minor detail to include—to big and thematic. I might have a big plot twist idea, or an epiphany idea for a character. But even the big ideas are condensed to just a sentence or two, because I have the constraints of the one-inch margin.
Why Constraints Make Research More Manageable
Why is a constraint useful?
Because when you’re writing a first draft, one of your biggest enemies is overwhelm. Overwhelm is what stops most writers from finishing—the work feels too big, the project too complex or obtuse or daunting. And so before anything else, we have to find ways of making the work manageable.
Restricting the time or space is a way we can do this. Margins are space. Smaller space means more manageable ideas. Think of the margins of the book like a suitcase you’re packing for a trip—it’s a container that prevents you from taking too many maybe-I’ll-wear-this outfits so that you can actually haul your bag onto the train and wear what you brought.
Now, I use the term “margins” loosely here. Many of my notes are short enough that they fit into the one-inch white column on the page, but sometimes my scribbles drift onto the book’s blank end pages…which exist in every book. But rarely do they venture outside of the book itself.
On every page where I make a note in the margin, I earmark the bottom corner.
When I finish, I go through all the earmarked pages and review my ideas. Any that I want to incorporate, I transfer into a “to do” list. Any that I’m no longer excited about, I leave.
Three Additional Benefits of Writing in Book Margins
Another great thing about this method is that it doesn’t just help you avoid overwhelm. There are two other benefits of the marginalia method that I want to highlight.
First, it’s efficient. More efficient than reading an entire book for research and then, separately, devoting effort to figuring out how you want to incorporate what you’ve learned into your story. We don’t want to be worshippers of efficiency by any means, but it’s also true that for those of us juggling jobs and families while writing, efficiency is undeniably valuable.
And second, it makes the reading super fun and interactive—sort of like you’re getting to read a book but also go on a treasure hunt at the same time. Last summer, we went to Paris, and my son, who was six at the time, was obsessed with the space invader game that one of our tour guides told us about: there are these little space invader paintings on buildings scattered throughout the city. Once my kid started looking for them, he was hooked. He’d forget his legs were tired and walk miles with us because he wanted to find the next invader.
Reading a book for research while also looking for story applications is kind of like this, for me. I’m on a quest, which brings a fresh energy to my reading while helping me conceptualize and retain the information. Win win.
And that’s my little tool for research—the marginalia method. I hope this was helpful, see you next week, when I’ll share thoughts on long-term goals, fatigue, and mindset.
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