Our Research Notes series invites authors to describe their process for a recent book, with “research” defined as broadly as they like. This week, Robert Tomaino writes about New Madrid from Woodhall Press.

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I never planned on writing an alternate history novel. When I started, I had written mostly short stories. The idea arose from a suggestion from a friend in my weekly writing group, The Fairfield Scribes. We decided we should all write an alternate history short story and put them together into an anthology. Despite the lack of background in the genre, I was in. Not everyone was comfortable writing this type of story, and I found the genre challenging.

My story was called New Madrid and freed from the constraints of the anthology it grew, with significant fits and starts, into a short novel. New Madrid is about a reluctant sheriff of the town of New Madrid, Missouri in 1811. Research was paramount to the story because the novel follows several actual events including the largest continental earthquake in U.S. history, the growing presence of the Shawnee chief Tecumseh and his attempt to unite various Native American tribes, continued hostility with the British, and an assortment of bad luck and poor planning that plagued the growing town. At the time, New Madrid was the largest settlement on the river between St. Louis and Natchez, Mississippi. The town was a growing riverport, offering a gateway to the west and an important stop for those traveling the river. The town still exists, nestled on a bend of the Mississippi River. It is not at the exact location as it was in the novel because of several events, which are covered in the narrative.

I first became aware of New Madrid when I read an article about the earthquake, so powerful that the Mississippi River ran backward for a day. Such a unique and remarkable event lends itself well to metaphor and I was looking for something that could stand in for upheaval and change, but with the hope of rebirth and renewal. The mightiest river in the country running backward for a brief time fit perfectly!

In the United States, the year 1811 was an unusual, calamitous year, much like 2020. In addition to the earthquake, there were three hurricanes that hit the southeastern corner of the country, Congress pushed for war with Great Britain, the largest slave revolt in U.S. history occurred near New Orleans, and continuous fighting occurred with various Native American tribes and British troops. Another unusual event was, at the time, the longest continually sighted comet, blazing across the skies for approximately 260 days. Many newspapers from that time decried the comet as an omen of some significance.

Because of the current pandemic, my research was mainly limited to Internet searches and whatever books I could obtain. I found dribs and drabs, references to people and places during that time. Most searches about New Madrid in 1811 lead to stories about the earthquake. One of the best sources was actual first-hand accounts of the earthquake from survivors, their words recorded in the newspapers of the day. The pandemic made my research efforts more challenging as there are places to go for more detailed information, such as museums, historical societies, libraries, etc. When I was delving into this story, the pandemic had closed most of these places, hampering my overall research.

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DON’T FORGET ABOUT LIBRARIES!

I firmly believe that libraries are our most underutilized and underappreciated public resource. I wish I could have visited my local libraries during the research phase of my project. Once my local library allowed me to enter the building post-pandemic, I was able to find more resources on the time period. And, as with any novel, more information led to new ideas. An entire subplot could have been added to the book from some of the news stories I dug up in the library. The Internet is a fantastic resource but so are libraries, access to subscription databases, obscure or difficult-to-find books, and other research resources. Not to mention, that these often unobstructive buildings contain more books on a subject that a person can possibly obtain themselves — a fact I think we sometimes forget.

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YOU STILL HAVE TO WRITE

Obviously, alternate history as a genre gives a writer some flexibility, but as my first foray into this type of writing, I’d definitely allocate more time to research and verifying facts. This is true even for information not paramount to the story. Research is critical in an alternate history story. It’s akin to the maxim sometimes attributed to the Dalai Lama XIV, “know the rules well, so you can break them effectively.” Know the history well, so you can alter them effectively! Ironically, the alternate history genre puts a greater necessity on the writer to get the facts straight, otherwise chaos in the reading will probably ensue.

Research also led to interesting quirks or decisions. One actual person who appears briefly in the novel is Thomas Riddle. That name may sound familiar to fans of Harry Potter. What do you do in such a situation? Change the name although it’s an actual person who lived near New Madrid during that time, or alter the character’s name under the banner of alternate history? I left the name in because Thomas Riddle existed, and another fiction book shouldn’t be relevant to my story.

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RESEARCH LEADS TO NEW PATHS

Originally, my novel took place in the town of Arkopolis, which was a proposed name for Little Rock, Arkansas. During my research, I found an old map with the name Arkopolis and was immediately intrigued. However, I struggled to flesh out the developing short story in that setting. It was while researching more about Arkansas and the name Arkopolis that I came across the earthquake that occurs in my novel and the other historically significant events of the year 1811. Moving the story to New Madrid forced me to rewrite and dive back into research. I had to learn about this new town, the surrounding lands, and other information germane to the setting. However, the change opened new avenues to explore the story and themes I was working on.

Much of my other writing is fiction, which requires plumbing the depths of my imagination. But, when I write nonfiction or fiction with an historical slant, I will be ready to delve into the endless Internet and rummage the stacks of the closest libraries to help bring the characters and story to life.

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