Writers Getting It Right

There’s this fabulous scene in Woody Allen’s Annie Hall –where this know-it-all pontificates about Marshall McLuhan–that sets the stage for what I’m about and where I’m at today.  Take a sec to watch this–or if you know the shtick already, then just skip ahead:

There’s a fancy name for this, by the way: ultracrepidarianism, or the unfortunate tendency some folks have for offering opinions and critiques about things with which they’ve got little experience or knowledge.

Now, a very smart guy once said something to his kid that applies to everyone: “Don’t let your confidence exceed your knowledge.”  This is great advice for just about everything in life. 

Contrast that to this: A couple months ago, another very smart and über-famous guy—a writer—was asked how he seems to be in command of all this arcane stuff that even people in that particular field or area don’t know or have never heard of.  His answer (and I paraphrase) was telling: “If you say something with enough confidence and authority, people will believe you.”

Mull that one over for a second.  What that person’s really saying is that a lot of people can be counted on to be . . . well . . . sheep.  To stop thinking.

Now, that attitude is fine to a point.  I mean, this is the project of fiction: to take something that might seem ordinary or even unbelievable and create enough suspension of disbelief that you, the reader, will simply take whatever’s offered on faith.  You’ll go along because you’re swept up and the story’s good enough.  Heck, there are plenty of times when I’m not sure about something I’ve just read—kind of scratch my head and go, Really?—then shrug and move on because the story’s that good, or I figured I’ll look it up later.  (Which I frequently do.)

But there are also times that really doesn’t work for me.  We’ve probably all had those moments when a writer’s made a huge factual boo-boo that just punts you right out of the story.  I know I have.  For example, that writer who clearly knows NOTHING about diving and has a character clear her mask in a way that’s guaranteed to flood it . . . well, considering that diving is a big part of the book and the mystery’s about what happened during a dive, I gave up after a bit because the writer hadn’t done her homework, or if she had, she wasn’t massaging things well enough to keep me interested.  I mean, I’ll forgive a lot so long as it’s not in my face every five seconds. No one’s perfect.

As a writer, I’ve been called out on mistakes, sometimes nicely, sometimes very snarkily.  I remember one HUGE error pretty early on in my writing career that I didn’t catch but a reader did—and called me out on it, in public.  He was right, though.  After that, I was so embarrassed I made it my business to KNOW what I was talking about before I wrote about something  real, whether that was to research the subject myself or ask an expert in the field (and, frequently, both).

First off, it is no shame not to know everything.  Second, it’s kind of fun to learn new things.  Third, it’s better for your books if you DO know what’s real, so you can bend the rules in a believable way because there are always moments when your vision doesn’t quite match up to reality.  That’s when you have to massage things—either drop that particular angle or hypothesize some sort of work-around that won’t destroy the story.

But there may be times when that can’t happen.  For example, if you’re using a real locale, you’d better know some real landmarks and distances because you can bet that if you put in something extraneous that isn’t there without something real right alongside, someone who knows the area or location or whatever will be mighty pissed.  That person might even vent, in public, and let you know about it.  There have been days when I’ve wanted to whip off an email to guys in charge of the Netflix series, House of Cards, because they’ve made a major boo-boo when Frank Underwood becomes VP.  Instead of moving, the guy’s still living in his house.  Uh . . . no, I think not.  The VP lives on the grounds of the Naval Observatory; every VP has since the late ‘70s for the simple reason that the machinations you saw on the show, all the security re-do in Underwood’s townhouse, were simply too expensive.

And how do I know this?  Because I used to live in D.C., simple as that.  So I know the show’s got it wrong, and there isn’t an episode that hasn’t gone by this season when I don’t kinda shake my head.  It’s a minor point, but it’s annoying as all hell.  (I mean, Homeland got it right, for Pete’s sake—and you’re telling me the HoC writers can’t be bothered to look this up? They think we’re that stupid?)

Now, the whole reason I bring this up—this fine line between balancing fact without being so slavishly devoted to it that you destroy a story (or conversely, that you’ve been too lazy to get your facts straight and end up destroying your story that way)—is because I went off on kind of a mini-rant on Facebook the other day.  See, I got all torqued about this book I was reading by an author I’ve liked and whose writing I’ve respected (and, for the most part, still do; I’ve always got more to learn from people way more successful than I).  The writer is, in fact, the very same person who said that little thing about confidence and authority you read earlier: that people will believe you, regardless, so long as you write as if you know what you’re talking about.

Perhaps this works, too, if the factual error is small (people have forgiven me) or readers REALLY don’t know anything. You figure–hope–they’ll just take your word on it.  Writers do this all the time.

Except here’s what got to me.

In this particular book, the writer made a huge error in terms of a psych med.  HUGE.  We’re talking a mega-boo-boo of gigantic proportions.  (He made another error in terms of a weapon—kind of surprising, given what the guy writes about—but I’ll just let that one slide because it was a) a passing reference and b) not integral to the plot. Live and let live, I say. )

The med mistake, though . . . that’s a different animal. It might not have bothered me so much if this had been a passing reference.  You know, X-character is taking Y-med, and oh by the way, let’s get on with the story.  The problem was/is that the med itself is a major plot point.  Like there’s this kind of countdown going on: only so many pills left, and then . . .  So the mistake is in my face every couple of chapters.

As a shrink, this is just plain annoying.  Like, buddy, you can’t find one doc to set you straight?  You can’t do a Google search?  Read the prescribing information on WebMD?  You can’t be bothered?  Wuh?

As a writer . . . I can’t tell you how irritating that is because it’s such a simple error to rectify.  It just take a little bit of legwork.

What’s clear to me is that this writer just didn’t bother—and that’s annoying.  It’s insulting on multiple levels.  Forget me as a shrink.  Think about this implication that a person on a psych med is only a pill away from completely losing it.  OMIGOD, SHE RAN OUT!!!  Believe me, if a patient is that badly off?  He/she belongs in a hospital.  I’m serious.  (Oh, and we’ll just leave aside the fact that the character only a pill away from losing it is, predictably, female.  Did I mention that?  Shoot.  Ilsa, sshh, stop it.)

That it’s outright wrong about a very common med that a lot of people take is also a tad problematic.  Can you see these folks going to their docs: “Say, so-and-so said that you take the med like this.  So how come I got to take it like that?”  This does happen, folks.  Sure did when I was in practice, just as people sometimes wondered why I couldn’t be more like Deanna Troi. (Sorry, guys, it’s called fiction for a reason.)

A writer can’t be right about everything.  But she should try to be.  She should try to get her facts straight.  She should go talk to people who know what they’re about.  Not to do so is laziness.  It’s arrogance.  Behavior like that smacks of someone who’s just waaay too famous to bother and/or whose editor is either lazy or too cowed to mention, “Saaay, are you sure about this?”  (With my editors?  I’d never get away with this.  When I’ve written something an editor doesn’t readily know or can’t research, that person has always asked—and I’ve always provided documentation to support what I’ve written.  Heck, my *copy-editors* go the extra mile and look things up if they’re not a hundred percent sold.)

Think about it this way: just how seriously would you take a book if it got a fact you know completely wrong—and did it repeatedly?  Like, in your face, constantly—and you’re paying for the privilege because you spent money on the book?  Would you honestly be willing to give that person a go next time around?

Well . . . maybe.

Or maybe not.