Somewhere Between Love & Pain

A "Boonie" Rooster in Guam.

Hello, Shelley here.

As you Type M readers may know, I often complain about technology, social media, AI, and the interwebs in general. But the thing is, sometimes I LOVE Google. 

It’s not that I think all internet is bad. Because sometimes it’s awesome. Truly awesome. 

How the Internet is Awesome

For instance, I’ve been on a tear lately finishing up my novella.

I’m having so much fun with this story, especially one particular scene setting. Coastal Maine town. A beautiful Queen Anne house overlooking the ocean. Night of the Strawberry Moon (June’s full summer moon, around the time of the solstice). In this scene(s) I get to write about a fancy party, preppy coastal grandma types, and NYC publishing types dressed in sharp black fashions. 

This is how it goes: Tap, tap, tap on the keys. Scene playing behind my eyes as I’m writing. Oops, what’s that? I get an image. I want to verify said image, so I click open another tab on the laptop and open a search and type in my topic. 

Voila! 

(Do I skim the AI stuff at the top? Of course. Eyes can’t help it. But I always go to links listed below to verify because we know that AI bots hallucinate.)

I realized today that all these searches are fun and I should probably create some “socials” content to share with my readers. “See, readers, this is what writers do all day. They sit in their comfy pink-flamingo pajamas and look up things like how did the Kennedy family made its money after Prohibition and what exactly IS an Aubusson carpet, anyway?”

Here are some actual topics I’ve looked up the last two days:

Aubusson carpets, specifically do they make pink and blue ones? Sort of, but light browns and pinks might be more realistic. They are French. Good quality. I want some now. Sigh. 

Ceiling medallions. House of Antique Hardware. Egg & Dart style chosen for my scene. Not the fanciest, but sometimes it’s classier to show some restraint. It’s not Downton Abbey after all. 

Peonies, specifically companion planting. I HAVE peonies at my Maine house, but this is a fancy place on the coast that probably hired professional landscapers to pick the right mix of plants. Someone crushed a peony and left a short trail of petals across the lawn. Mentioned in the garden are sea roses, lavender, and fox gloves even though this is not a poison story. 

Kennedys. Did Joseph Kennedy really make money during Prohibition by bootlegging liquor? Probably not. So I mention it as a joke and then call out the truth that it’s just a myth. No need to get Kennedys mad at you when you are small, indie-pressed author. 

Mary Cassatt artwork. My sleuth’s client has a Cassatt hanging in her office. I wanted to know how much one might cost. I want one now. 

Six-over-six windows. I knew this but wanted to make sure I wasn’t hallucinating. Easy check. 

Florentine glass windows. Specifically, what can you see through them. Not much. Light and blurry movement I think will be okay. 

1920s office door with window. Very cool. I want one now. 

LBD for plump woman. Side character. Needed inspo for a “tiny” but realistic detail. 

Throw Up Emoji. Considered using this in a “text” in my manuscript but then realized it probably wouldn’t translate into formatting so why go there? I sorta want to go there. I might have to look up how to do it when I format this novella. 

If someone is knocked out with a head wound, what should you do? This is where I think the AI/Large Language Models are helpful. You can ask a question in regular language, not search optimized terms or whatever. But you have to go to the links to make sure the thing isn’t hallucinating. Also, I pretty much knew this, but again, wanted to make sure. 

Kodak Camera 1980s. I had one. I wanted to use it in my novella. I couldn’t remember what it was called. 

This is just a sampling. There’s more. Oh boy, there’s more. So here is my moment of gratitude for Google and the internet. I can’t even imagine how I would have written this without these quick references. Maybe I’d have had a set of encyclopedias? Or maybe my story would have been very different. Less exact. Maybe having all this info at our fingertips is changing the way stories are detailed? It might be interesting to look. I seem to recall that Stephen King used a lot of commercial brand names and such even in his early work. 

But what about Agatha Christie? (I just looked to make sure I was spelling her name right!) I think she probably looked up train time tables and things like that, but for setting details maybe she relied more on her powers of recall. 

Am I just getting a lazy brain? Hope you all have a good weekend. It’s my 33rd wedding anniversary today. We’ll be going out to dinner in Guam. Should be fun. 

—

Check out my latest PINK DANDELIONS newsletter with an essay on Romanticizing Your Life, which sounds way more Tik Toky than it is. It’s really some ideas for being in the moment and enjoying even the small, mundane parts of life because they are beautiful, or you can make them beautiful. Anyway, read the essay to get the whole gist.