I recently wrote about writing what you know, but the stories I want tell often lead me down unfamiliar paths.
In the case of my new novel Tied, the world of girl gangs was a big unknown. It wasn’t a matter of studying boy gangs and changing the gender. The differences ran much deeper than that. But through books and the Internet, I was able to gain valuable knowledge that helped me build my particular world and the characters within it.
This video is a great example of what can be learned, specifically about back story, motivation, character traits, and dialogue style (and vocabulary). It’s not as good as the real thing (which I got a taste of on the bus a day or so ago), but it’s pretty close.
A complete interview is here, courtesy of the BBC.