{"id":246,"date":"2019-12-11T05:23:49","date_gmt":"2019-12-11T05:23:49","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.naomihirahara.com\/blog\/?p=246"},"modified":"2019-12-13T20:29:19","modified_gmt":"2019-12-13T20:29:19","slug":"writing-wednesday-researching-the-next-next","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.naomihirahara.com\/blog\/2019\/12\/11\/writing-wednesday-researching-the-next-next\/","title":{"rendered":"Researching the Next Next"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>As I&#8217;m leading a life of writing, I also have to prepare for the next as well as the next next. In fact, I started doing some heavy duty research for the book I&#8217;m writing now about two years ago, while I was writing the final Mas Arai mystery, HIROSHIMA BOY, which was published last year.<\/p>\n<p>For people who are more linear&#8211;who like to approach projects from A to B, then B to C, etc., this may seem like a wacky way to work. How can you write a novel, while preparing for something that you may be writing two years from now. I find that I need to start planting seeds early, testing out different soil and planters, to see the best container for my story. It&#8217;s best to start this mental experimentation while I&#8217;m actually writing something else. This way, the growth of story can be more wild and organic. It&#8217;s like that patch of seeds that you planted, but haven&#8217;t watched consistently. I&#8217;m not counting on its development to sustain me financially just yet. Later, when I&#8217;ve seen how the seedlings have responded to sun, I can figure out how to manipulate it, prune it and tie it down.<\/p>\n<p>Research is a delight in itself for me and unlike writing sometimes, requires a map and a plan. I feel like I&#8217;m traveling the high seas, understanding the steps I need to go forward, but also knowing that there will be surprises.<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone wp-image-248\" src=\"https:\/\/www.naomihirahara.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/12\/IMG_5049-300x225.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"552\" height=\"414\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.naomihirahara.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/12\/IMG_5049-300x225.jpg 300w, https:\/\/www.naomihirahara.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/12\/IMG_5049-768x576.jpg 768w, https:\/\/www.naomihirahara.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/12\/IMG_5049-1024x768.jpg 1024w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 552px) 100vw, 552px\" \/><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>As I&#8217;m leading a life of writing, I also have to prepare for the next as well as the next next. In fact, I started doing some heavy duty research for the book I&#8217;m writing now about two years ago, while I was writing the final Mas Arai mystery, HIROSHIMA BOY, which was published last [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"image","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-246","post","type-post","status-publish","format-image","hentry","category-writing-wednesday","post_format-post-format-image"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.naomihirahara.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/246","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.naomihirahara.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.naomihirahara.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.naomihirahara.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.naomihirahara.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=246"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/www.naomihirahara.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/246\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":251,"href":"https:\/\/www.naomihirahara.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/246\/revisions\/251"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.naomihirahara.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=246"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.naomihirahara.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=246"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.naomihirahara.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=246"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}