(The above image is by Corey A. Potter and is licensed under a
Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 license.)
A stray thought, and maybe this is the right place to put it.
I was recently looking up a detail on ships and boats for a story. I'm fascinated by things nautical, even though my actual experience is very minor (I was briefly a deckhand on a harbor cruise ship.) As is often the case when I'm researching something, I've really enjoyed learning some new facts and sharing them.
Grounding fiction in fact can make it more convincing. The fancy term for this is "verisimilitude," a semblance of reality, a different word than "realism." Why the distinction? "Verisimilitude" acknowledges that we're not reporters conveying real events; we're storytellers trying to hook readers into believing in a story, at least for the duration of reading it. So the goal isn't conveying real information but making the story seem real through careful use of detail.
As a side note, this is why science fiction writers often can't resist using numbers ("the alien ship's nine kilometers off our bow -- point blank range") even in situations where there's no need for numbers and they increase the chance of error (say if you've already specified that your heroes' ship's lasers have a maximum effective range of eight kilometers.) Numbers just sound authoritative. 73% of Americans can't resist making them up. (I made that up.)
So the goal of verisimilitude is to convince, not to report on the world, whether the fictional one or the real one. Excessive use of detail is, in fact, generally looked down upon in writing as overdone exposition, or "info-dumping." To convince readers is an important practical goal for writers -- a convinced reader is more likely to be an entertained reader, and an entertained reader is more likely to be a return customer. More detail can actually work against this goal, by taking a reader out of the story.
But should our investigation of the real world in fiction begin and end with verisimilitude? Should we only present facts as a kind of sweetener to make the reader swallow the medicine of our fine literature? And what is that medicine? Characterization? Philosophy? Social commentary? Pure entertainment?
Nothing wrong with any of the above. But something nags at me: the thought that maybe we shouldn't limit our use of facts to a kind of sales job. Because the real world is an interesting place! A science fiction writer can include concepts from real-world science; this indeed is part of the draw of science fiction. A fantasy writer can include realistic details drawn from history. A mystery writer can include slice-of-life detail from interesting professions or parts of the world. A thriller writer can include details of actual espionage. And so on.
The risk, if you want to call it that, of using more real-world detail in fiction is that it will de-rail the story you have in mind. Say you want to have a character cross a redwood forest and you have a great scene in mind where they climb a tree to escape wolves. But on learning more about redwood trees you realize the trees aren't all that easy to climb.
But if your story doesn't jibe well with your own observations of the world, maybe it's the story that should bend, not the facts?
I want to chew on this idea a bit, so I'm putting it here.
I'm also delighted to announce I've got a story in the upcoming fantasy anthology Tales from Stolki's Hall, edited by Lou Anders. The stories are all set in Lou's Scandinavia-inspired setting of Norrøngard, which he first explored in his "Thrones and Bones" children's fantasy trilogy from Penguin Random House, and then adapted into a roleplaying game setting from Lazy Wolf Studios. Although the Norrøngard novels are children's books, this anthology is aimed at adults. I had a great time working a new story into Lou's fascinating setting. The anthology has ten stories from eleven contributors. More info is here.
(Edited because it took me this long to see I typed "trilled" instead of "thrilled.")
