Research: How much to include?
Indie Review: Hot Tango in Argentina + Short Story by Sheri McGuinn: Beach Party - First Kiss
Writers start as readers. We like stories, we like words, we like learning about stuff. When we’re researching a place or time or person for a piece of fiction, we collect far more information than our readers will ever need. It’s important to be selective when we choose details to include. It needs to be enough to put the reader in that time and place without losing track of the story.
If you click on the image below, you’ll go to my YouTube page - started years ago and not kept up well at all - for a narrated video of traffic in Peru. I was in Lima as an exchange student that summer. I’m giving this as an example of research. The video is less than two minutes long; the transcript would be a full page in a book.
I would not stop the action of a thriller or romance with a full page describing traffic. If it was essential to the plot, I still wouldn’t lump it into one page. I’d select details to sprinkle in when it made sense. She’d watch for the little green dude before dashing across the street, or nearly be hit by a bus making a right turn from the left lane. I wouldn’t mention the horns unless they covered up a shout or increased the character’s anxiety.
If, on the other hand, my objective was to prepare people for a safe visit to Lima or provide an armchair traveler with the feeling they’d been there, I’d use this clip to remind me of details that might end up taking more than a page. Then there are crossover books - like the one reviewed today.
Enjoy your research. The details you don’t write into your story still inform your decisions on what to write. You may use them another day - and you will always have the knowledge for your own sake.
Heads Up
Writing Opportunities
Your short-form, non-fiction work published this summer as featured guest episode for “The Daily Adventure”! 1500 views every month! You do not need to be a subscriber to submit. Details at the link. Deadline: June 10 Winning entry will be published summer 2026. Recommended by Joan Griffin.
Five Minutes is having a Micromemoir Marathon May 6-31. There are 26 contests (topics). All pieces must be 100 words, focus on a very short period of time (think five minutes) and center on a real event you experienced. Winners will receive $5. Full details here.
Book Life Prize for Fiction is open now through August 31. The $119 entry includes a critic’s report written by a Publishers Weekly reviewer, which includes a score across editorial categories and a brief critical assessment of the book, which can be quoted if you credit the BookLife Prize. While my novel didn’t make the finals last year, I have some great quotes from the assessment.
Kindle Book Awards: 2026 Registration deadline is Friday, May 15, books published 5/1/2023-5/1/2026. Cost $35.
This month, Chicken Soup is looking for stories for Best Cat Ever and Count Your Blessings, as well as other topics with deadlines further out. They have specific guidelines. All submissions need to be true and no AI should be used - even Grammarly. They pay $250 and 10 free copies after publication of a book with your story in it. If your story is chosen, they’ll have you sign a contract that specifies they get non-exclusive rights to publish, reprint, or use the story in other ways.
Free Advertising
Each month, BookLife runs the Indie Spotlight feature, a thematic roundup of self-published books both online and in print in Publishers Weekly magazine. Industry professionals, media professionals, and librarians read this magazine. There is no charge, but the competition is enormous. Fiction or nonfiction, adult or children’s, secular or religious, written or graphic - all types of books will be considered IF the subject matter matches the month’s topic.
In May, they’ll accept submissions for June - summer readers part 1: Mystery/Thriller/True Crime (I submitted All for One - Love, War, & Ghosts - fingers crossed!)
Follow these directions. Email submissions to booklifeeditor@booklife.com with required information and a subject line that changes each month.
Conferences & Other Education
How to Choose a Hybrid Press: Pre-Publication Research You Need to Know IPNE (Independent Publishers of New England) is hosting this FREE virtual session on May 20. Non-members welcome. Click on the link to register and they’ll email the zoom link to you.
BookLife provides ideas for DIY publishers on how to make book giveaways pay.
Other Resources
Beware: I’ve decided to keep these posted each week, as the need keeps arising. If you know another good site, let me know and I’ll add it.
https://writerbeware.blog (search on right)
https://authorsguild.org/resource/publishing-scam-alerts/ (most recent first)
https://www.allianceindependentauthors.org/watchdog/ (scroll down to view ratings links)
Jane Friedman - an hour-long YouTube on Spotting Publishing Scams & Bad Deals
Call to Action - Get your indie book reviewed!
If you’d like me to consider reviewing your indie book, details are explained in this website blog.
Free Books
Writers: Let me know when you’re doing a free or reduced price promotion and I’ll post it here! Readers: Enjoy and post reviews!
Those with Kindle Unlimited may read these books for free:
Tom Huggler’s The Woman She Left Behind - reviewed here January 13.
Geri Krotow’s A Midsummer Murder - Reviewed here January 27.
Angela Page Conti’s Enrico G
Joan Griffin’s Force of Nature - reviewed on my website blog (as I write this it’s free - it may be .99 April 28-30)
If you like speculative fiction, follow RI Partridge on Facebook. This month she’s got a curated list of thirty-one novels as a run-up to the release of the sequel to Escaping the Dashia. I was a beta reader on the sequel - it’s really good and available to pre-order May 14.
Book Review:
Hot Tango in Argentina by Nancy Nau Sullivan
Hot Tango in Argentina is one in a series of novels about Blanche Murningham, a woman who seems to fall into dangerous situations where her sleuthing skills are required. Each book is set in a different country - Vietnam, Mexico, Ireland, and, obviously, Argentina. Sullivan includes detailed descriptions and historical information that will appeal to armchair travelers. The thriller line is almost secondary. I'm not an armchair traveler, and I am familiar with Argentina’s history of the Dirty War and the Disappeared, so I skimmed parts that seemed to diminish the tension of the thriller thread. However, I kept reading because the story was entertaining, the history linked into the action, and the characters made me care what happened.
Hot Tango in Argentina was published by Torchflame Books. Their website indicates they are a hybrid. On their faq page, I found “What does it cost?” Their answer: “The cost of publishing a book with Torchflame Books using our hybrid publishing model is currently $8,895. Royalties are 60% to 75%.” Pricey.
Sullivan, however, was grandfathered in as a traditional author when Torchflame acquired portions of her previous publisher, Light Messages. She is quite happy with Torchflame. She said the only thing she paid for was some editing and they provided support for marketing. Speaking as an editor myself, the editing could have been better. However, they did a professional job with the layout and her covers are well-designed. They not only fit the genre, but clearly belong together. She is also excited that they have re-released an earlier novel, The Boys of Alpha Block, and plan to re-release her memoir, The Last Cadillac, soon. I look forward to reading both.
Fiction:
Beach Party - First Kiss
A sweet story written for Furious Fiction.
You can read this story on my website blog or listen to it here:
Other ways to support my work:
Buy my books.
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Talk about them.
Post reviews.
You can read a sample of each at these links:
Thanks.
Images are usually my own or used with permission. If I can’t find an image I want within the timeline for this newsletter, you’ll see an AI image labeled as such. More often, I’ll use that image to find the human-made one I want!
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©Sheri McGuinn
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