How to Research a Story Setting Without Leaving Your House

A piece of feedback I received on one of the early revisions of Monsters and Heroes was that the palace felt a bit too empty.

For this story, I didn’t need Game of Thrones-level political intrigue. But while I wanted to keep things minimal, I did want the capital to feel alive, so I made a few tweaks to add more activity, people, and texture to the palace scenes.

Writing the residents themselves wasn’t difficult, and relying on general knowledge was enough. We all know there are lords and ladies, servants and handmaids, advisors, guards, and of course, the royal family.

But then came a scene involving a bath, of all things, and I realized I had no idea what bathing in a palace would actually look like in an old-time setting.

That’s when I ran into a problem writers often face: not knowing enough about the time, place, or social norms of a story’s setting. This is especially true in fantasy that borrows from the Middle Ages, but it happens just as easily when writing about a real historical period or a country you’ve never lived in.

And it’s natural to be drawn to the unfamiliar and exotic. When I was a teen, it was common for girls to write sappy teen-series on their blogs, the kind that listed every character’s eye and hair color. Those stories almost always took place in New York or LA—places we only knew from TV shows but desperately wanted to recreate in our immature literary experiments.

Travel can inspire the same impulse. You visit a country, fall in love, and want to write about it, only to realize that what you saw as a tourist was just a glossy surface of its culture, customs, and struggles.

So what can you do?

The best way to understand a setting is to live in it, but since few of us can time-travel to the 17th century or spend a year in Japan, we have to make do with modern magic: information at our fingertips.

The Enchanted Screen

An easy way to study a place or period is through movies and series. Thought one might not be enough if you want to capture the world as someone who lives there.

Make a list of documentaries, films, shows, YouTube channels, and anything you can find. Be cautious, though. Period dramas are often criticized for historical inaccuracies, especially in costume or design. Luckily, there are creators and historians online who are passionate about getting those details right.

If your story takes place in a modern country you’ve never visited, following a local content creator can also help you grasp real-life moods, slang and nuances.

The Forbidden Scroll

Another great way of getting into the head of someone from a different time or culture is through books. If you want to understand 19th-century Russia, Dostoyevsky will serve you a heavy dose of existential depression. And if you want to grasp (relatively) modern Japanese sentiments, Murakami might be your guide.

Writers who grew up in the setting they depict often reveal layers that a documentary can’t. The only risk with this approach is the references and social commentary that might fly over your head, leaving you confused.

The Master and Margarita is one such book for me. I had to read it twice, the second time with my parents explaining all the political critique and nuances that I didn’t get.

The Invisible Servant

Trigger warning for technophobes and keyboard warriors: this section involves modern tools.

What if your story takes place in a generic old-time setting and you only need specific details? For instance, the first chapter of my current work in progress contains a scene taking place in the shop of a blacksmith, a trade I know only the basics about. I didn’t need to learn everything there is to know about social dynamics, customs, or a place, but just enough to make the shop come to life. Things that pull you into the scene like how it smells inside, and what you see and hear upon entry.

For specific information like that. Google and AI tools can help you find the details you need (the later without sifting through dozens of irrelevant articles).

As with movies, you’ll need to verify your sources, especially if your story references times and places that actually exist (with fantasy, you get a bit more of a margin for errors).

Conclusion

Old times and faraway places can be endlessly inspiring. But watching that one movie or visiting Florence once doesn’t make you an expert.

To avoid sounding like those teenage blog writers I told you about a few paragraphs back, hold your horses with the exact means in which horses were held in the century you’re writing about. In other words—do your research, then sprinkle your findings naturally into your story.

You don’t have to learn everything, just enough to make your world feel lived-in and believable. It will elevate your writing, or at the very least, reduce the odds of getting a snarky comment on your Amazon page.

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