Know Your Surroundings: Do a Little Research

When you write about cities and towns that actually exist, you need to get your details correct. There is some level of allowance when it comes to making up restaurants and shops, but if you are going to be specific, you need to get it right. Stephenie Meyer flew up to Forks and did her research and she did a good job on getting the details correct. EL James admits she only looked on google maps. Well, it shows. This biggest research bomb is when Ana and Christian are driving back to Seattle from Portland. She writes that they are driving through the Oregon blackness. No they aren't. Portland borders Washington but for a river. If the river wasn't there, Vancouver and Portland would be the same city with an imaginary line through it. There is no Oregon darkness on the drive up I-5 from Portland to Seattle. In fact, they would be a good 30 or so miles into Washington before they found any blackness, depending on the weather, likely 50 miles. Pike Street Market is where you shop for your groceries when your flat has a view of the market and you live like a block away. You don't go to a small Mom & Pop that doesn't even sell wine. She was specific enough to mention that their apartment overlooks the market and how they live in the market district--did she not google the market itself? It's one giant and I mean GIANT block of food. Fresh vegetables and fruits, butchers, fish mongers, bakeries, and specialty food shops go on forever and on multiple stories. She also made Ana a good cook, so yeah, they would have gone to Pike Place Market for groceries. It may sound petty, but you just don't visit whatever version of a 7-11 she wrote about. It's not even a question. This is where 50 Shades pales to Twilight. I understand she isn't writing it specifically for a Seattle audience, but the Pacific Northwest knows itself and so do people that visit. Get the details right if you're going to be that specific. I'm guessing she chose Seattle because it's the closest large metro area to Forks and it was, after all, originally a Twilight fan fiction, but again, like Stephenie, get it right before you publish for the masses. By the time editing was being done, she could have afforded the flight to Seattle--or heck, how about an editor that said "this isn't right." Aren't editors supposed to do that? James also made an error on the sail over to Bainbridge--they wouldn't also be going towards the Olympic range. She mentions seeing Mt. Ranier behind them as they leave Seattle--well that's where the Olympic range would be--behind them. Keep going past Bainbridge and you reach the ocean. Not mountains. Oops. I also had trouble believing they stopped for fuel in Shannon Ireland if they are flying to London from Seattle. His plane can't make it non-stop? Pretty sure it could. If not, it would've stopped just before leaving the states. Ok so I didn't research this, maybe she did, but it just didn't seem right to me, and certainly not important enough to be a necessary plot point. She had the one-way street going the wrong way in front of the Heathman. The whole R8 u-turn would have sent them in the wrong direction from OHSU and also the wrong way down the street. That really bothered me. Again, if you are going to be that specific, that detailed, about a real location, you have to get those details right. You either research it more than looking on a map, although in this case I'm guessing she just looked on the Heathman's web page, or you write it a little vague so someone like me doesn't pick it apart. EL James' British-ness came out in her writing and being married to a Londoner and having lived over there, I caught it, others may not have. For me it was like catching Rob Pattinson losing his accent in the movies. If you know what to listen for you'll hear it, otherwise not. I actually enjoyed reading it, because I heard it in the accent. It was just a few ways they speak "I'm crap at it," for example. We don't use that expression in that way. There were others peppered throughout. Not a bad thing, but if you are having your characters speak out loud, it's best not to have them speak the Queen's English if they aren't British. One example of her innate British-ness was in her menus. It is a stretch to think that at a summer dinner (when Ana had dinner at his parent's house after graduation and moving to Seattle) in the Pacific Northwest anyone would serve roast winter veggies with a roast meat. That menu was very English and the wrong season. And the dessert was way too British. No one here eats syllabub anymore, or likely even knows what one is. I have a feeling that when people read that, google trended on the word "syllabub." Dessert is not a high point in the British eating experience and it shows in the series. Those of us who live in the Pacific Northwest, especially those that can afford it, eat locally and eat seasonally. That menu sounded weird. And again, it's something that should have been caught by an editor. Did anyone else think it was odd that when Grace had everyone over for Christian's birthday party, especially when she was privy to the good news of their engagement, she had a buffet in the kitchen? They live in a three story colonial mansion on the bay, throw garden parties for 300 in a tent outside that is more lavish than a state dinner, yet for a son's birthday and engagement announcement, it's a buffet in the kitchen? Not a huge deal, but still something that stood out enough to be noticed.