Our Research Notes series invites authors to describe their process for a recent book, with “research” defined as broadly as they like. This week, Jessica Strawser writes about The Last Caretaker from Lake Union Publishing.
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Second Nature
Early December
As a writer, when it’s time to brainstorm a new idea, I like to take long, pensive walks, dictating notes as they occur to me—preferably in a tranquil setting away from distractions. As a woman, when I want to venture into a remote location alone, I need to be careful about how and where I do it.
We all know the bare minimum rules: Tell someone where you’re going and when you expect to return; take your phone; carry pepper spray or at the very least be ready to jab an attacker with your keys. We’ve all heard the stories, too: I’m still haunted by Maggie O’Farrell’s writing of the time she evaded assault on a mountain trail, only to learn the man raped and strangled another woman instead. We all do these risk/reward calculations; like other vulnerable groups, we’re taught them early enough to make the learned behavior feel like common sense, until we don’t think too long or hard about it. When we do think about it, we tell ourselves men do the same things… even if the truth is that such modifications or precautions rarely cross their minds.
In my Cincinnati hometown, our top nature center maintains multiple properties with a membership model, where access to trailheads and facilities is behind a gate—and a paywall designed to be affordable for most anyone. For many nature lovers and families, membership fees or day passes are a no-brainer: The grounds are well maintained, provide a space for wildlife conservation and ecological research, and offer educational programming for all ages.
I doubt I’m the only one who has my own reasons on top of the advertised benefits. Namely: It’s reasonable to presume anyone looking to break into parked cars or harass unsuspecting hikers will opt for one of the plentiful free, public parks with no record of who is coming in and out. A decade into my membership, it doesn’t matter if I occasionally tire of walking the same paths, or even when my routes are rendered inconvenient by road construction or storm damage. The parameters of my comfort zone are firm.
I never thought much about it until one day I did.
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A False Sense of Security
It was a cold November weekday, and I was getting the sinking feeling that the novel proposal my agent was shopping wasn’t going to go. With frustration setting in, I headed out for a hike—but not to brainstorm new novel ideas. Rather, I intended to brainstorm things I could do more of instead of writing a novel. Editing, mentoring, freelancing. It was time for my scattershot approach to become focused. (Such was the sticker shock of my early holiday shopping.)
I opted for the most remote Cincinnati Nature Center property, the one without a human at the gate. I scanned my card and drove up the hill, past the turnoff for the caretaker’s residence. I was used to seeing only a handful of cars in the gravel visitors lot, but on this day, mine was the only one. On all 767 acres.
I was delighted.
As gravel and wet leaves crunched beneath my hiking boots, I headed off thinking how nice it was to feel comfortable doing so. Here in Ohio, there’s not much wildlife to be fearful of. It would be highly unlikely to encounter, say, a bear or a venomous snake—it’s one of the area’s best perks if you’re a chicken with an overactive imagination like me. This frees you to focus your worries on the people who take advantage of our new permitless carry laws without any firearms safety training whatsoever. But I digress.
I felt so uncharacteristically secure, in fact, I began to wonder if my sense of security was a false one. Only vehicles need pass through the gate. Nothing but the out-of-the-way location would stop anyone else from wandering in. There was the resident caretaker, of course, keeping an eye on things, but presumably that had more to do with property maintenance. I had never once seen the caretaker, though I relished glimpses of the old farmhouse through the trees. This blustery November, with all the branches newly bare, I had a clearer glimpse than usual. As always, I wondered what it might be like having this place to yourself after hours.
Specifically, I wondered if resident caretaking was one of those things that sounded more amazing in theory than it would be in practice—putting me in mind of that viral Outside article about a writer who moved to a Walden–esque cabin and proceeded to hate every minute.
This time, I paid closer attention to details I’d overlooked before. The simple signs around the perimeter of the house: “No Trespassing: Private Property.” The volume of barns and other outbuildings surrounding the residence. The silty, smelly pond where you could submerge just about anything beneath the surface and never see it again.
I wondered if the caretaker was a woman. I wondered how she’d gotten the job, and how long she’d been there, and if she lived alone. I wondered if the caretaker was happy to see the trails flush with visitors or if those were her least favorite days. I wondered how much of my false sense of security she shared, and whether it was false at all.
I had wondered all these things before. But that day, for the first time, I wondered if she might be able to use the position to her advantage. Or maybe even for a cause of her own.
One that had more to do with protecting vulnerable women than conserving vulnerable land.
And suddenly, I didn’t want to meet the caretaker anymore. I wanted to dream up my own.
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The Man
My nine-year-old daughter is in her Taylor Swift Era. As I drive her to dance class and volleyball, she dictates song requests from the backseat—the catchy ones that capture girlhood dreams. “Love Story,” “Our Song,” “You Belong With Me.” Lately, a new song has made its way into her rotation of favorites: “The Man,“ which unsubtly and brilliantly womansplains the patriarchy.
I’m not sure what to make of the fact that a child of that young age has already found much to relate to in those lyrics. But anyone can see what she likes about it: The power shift. Because pointing out the double standard is a clever way to acknowledge all the things a strong woman might not get credit for. But who needs credit, anyway, when the people whose opinions really matter can see us for what we are?
Some novel ideas, you research by learning as much as you can about a setting, an area of expertise, what it’s like to walk in a character’s shoes.
Others, you’ve quietly researched your entire life, without even realizing it.
It’s become second nature.
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Jessica Strawser (jessicastrawser.com) is the author of six novels, most recently The Last Caretaker, about a woman who accepts a resident caretaking job at a nature reserve only to discover it houses a secret safehouse for domestic violence victims on the run. She is editor-at-large at Writer’s Digest, where she was editorial director for nearly a decade, and her work has appeared in The New York Times Modern Love, Publishers Weekly, and other fine venues. She lives with her husband and two young children in Cincinnati, where she was named 2019 Writer-in-Residence for the Public Library of Cincinnati and Hamilton County.