I'm a Vietnamese and despite being a gun lover, I've never hold a real gun. But I do want to write a novel in which the main character is a gun reviewer for a magazine. And so the best idea that come to my mind is that I should try to make up fictional firearms and write reviews (as the character) about them.

Here is an example: https://drive.google.com/open?id=1Ir...***Cb183a1nMRU

Like I wrote above, I've no real-life experience with gun. All I learn (an copy) is from the articles, videos, and podcasts. Because of that, you can see a passage or two that is extremely similar to something else that you've read on the internet. Sorry in forward because of this imitation.

So, did I write a "readable" article? And what would you think of the person writing it?

I'm not going to insult you about your work; I don't know your intended audience.

I reviewed a popular "action book" for our local book club, which book was written by a good writer who had learned the devices of vivid descriptions, cliff hanger chapter endings, etc, but who violated the first writer's rule: pick a subject you know about. My review ended with: "This book is suitable only for audiences that know nothing about guns except what they have seen on bad television programs. To anyone actually experienced with guns, it is an insulting parody that is too technically flawed to hold any interest."

That is the trap of writing about something unfamiliar. I'm sure if I tried to write a story about 19th century whaling ships, it would come off as shallow and derivative.

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Science plus Art

When I help my grandchildren with their homework, they often try to copy/paste other people's work and take credit for it, without ever understanding the subject. I make them read and understand the authors viewpoint before copying it. More than once they have told me that it was helpful later, when asked to discuss the subject in front of the class.

If you do your own research, you will then have ownership and confidence in your output, and the opinion of anonymous web people would be unnecessary.

Good luck with your project.

chúc may mắn

To make your fake gun review realistic, you must harp on about the trigger on the gun not being like that on a 1911. The fake review must also contain repeated statements showing undying love for the .45 ACP 1911 regarding weight, caliber, looks, and, of course, the trigger just in case the reader missed it the first time. Just read most real gun reviews and you will see a LOT of column inches devoted to the writers preferences when they should be assessing the gun.

If you think this is a pet peeve of mine, you are 100% correct.

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Release the Kraken

Hi Fireminer:

Welcome to the Forum.

I appreciate your enthusiasm, and willingness to write about a topic where you don't have any actual hands-on experience in. One thing you should be aware of is the concept of credibility. If someone writes about something and provides information that is not true or accurate, the writer will usually lose their audience at that point.

As an example, a few years ago, a young writer posted one of his novels online. The writer claimed to be a former military officer, as well as a small arms expert. His novel is about a former mercenary who is also a contract killer (i.e. a "hit man"). While the writer could write well, it was very obvious that the he had little if any military experience. Additionally, his character's favorite weapon was a Ruger Mk-II heavy barreled pistol...chambered in .45ACP. Uh, no way. The Ruger Mk-II is an excellent pistol, but it is only manufactured in .22LR - a round that is less than half the diameter of the .45ACP, and much less powerful than the .45ACP.

I quit reading the novel at that point. I mean, even though the book was a work of fiction, I had no confidence in any thing the writer had to say.

I have two suggestions I hope will be useful to you:

1. Don't use a lot of details until you have learned more about the subject matter. As an example, you might just say your character had to complete his review of a new polymer framed handgun. Don't list an actual manufacturer, or model name or number.

2. Start acquiring, if possible, gun magazines to increase your knowledge base and familiarity with firearms. The American Rifleman is an excellent, well written magazine, but I think you should also read other magazines such as Guns and Ammo, American Handgunner, and Shooting Times.

Best of luck,

Dave

Most areas have shooting ranges where you can get instructed in basic gun safety, and then rent handguns and others to fire. After firing ask if you can help cleaning. At that point you will have a real perspective on a few firearms. You might try a revolver and a semi-auto, for the experience of telling the difference, just remember, there are dozens if not hundreds of different designs. This is called "Field Research".

Wow! That is an overwhelming amount of responds. Thank you!

Yes, that is my point exactly!

Anyway, I don't write for a living. I'm just doing it to find out whether am I cut to it. So the premise of my story is pretty much simple: I want to write about the live of a depression salaryman (think of the Japanese.) And so, it is immediately clear to me that my character has to be an American and working in the firearm industry (reverse-stereotype, I know.)

The problem is: I'm not American, and beside reading the magazines and watching videos, I know almost nothing about the firearm world. So it's really tough for me to write a believable, much less an authentic gun guy.

Thank you (but why do you know Vietnamese)!

Dully noted!

That is really helpful! And I do routinely read a number of firearm magazines. My favorite is Small Arm Defense Journal and Gun Digest.

But you can see I wrote above that I really want to know the people behind the guns, too. In general, I've little experience with the American culture beside the mass media. So that is why I try to write something like that article or joined this forums. It's an attempt to imitate a real person, so that I could write a believable character.

Well... This is the most problematic stuff. I live in Hanoi, Vietnam. The government here outlawed private possession of hunting rifle nearly a decade ago. The only way I can have a gun is to buy it illegally in the northern provinces border China (you can buy all sort of things in Lạng Sơn.)

But what you've written isn't completely incorrect in Vietnam: I heard that there are places like that, but they are only available to tourists (like our casino here) and located all the way to the South.

I am a writer and was a firearms and other equipment reviewer for about 30 years. So, I understand your situation. If you don't really know guns, all you can do is to imitate the British (and very often, US) novelists who mention guns.

Some make horrible errors that cause me to stop reading their books. Others, like the famous Jack Higgins, fall back on just mentioning logical brand names, without specifying models or details. He usually just calls a pistol a 9mm Browning or a Walther PPK, because those are used by the British military and are familiar to him. Otherwise, he may just write "Ceska" and you have to guess from the description of the person and where he carries the gun whether he has a 9mm CZ-75 or a 7.65mm M-1950. Higgins does mention Colt .25's, using hollowpoint bullets that are far more powerful than they really are. And that raises the question as to whether these are old Colts, made before WWII or were the later Spanish Asta-made one finished and sold by Colt. But even those were made before 1968.

THe man who's done this best was Peter O'Donnell, in his superb series about Modesty Blaise. Look her up on the Net. A fascinating heroine! The books are fine. The movies and a TV series were awful. But she ran as a comic strip, too, in 57 countries. That was also really good.

Anyway, I think O'Donnell read copies of, "Guns & Ammo", which he mentioned that one deviant character read and hid under his bed, as if it was suspicious to read a gun magazine in the UK! Most of his characters used guns very plausible for them. Modesty relied on an unknown mdoel of "Colt .32" in earlier books, or a MAB (French) .25. The .32 was logicallya Cobra or Detecte Special. She also sed a &W .41 Magnu on ocasin One vilainhd a S&W odyguar .38. Mstalso used rifles wel, an oftennhaa AR-15. She had also been taugto se a .303Lee-Enfied as te trained British soldiers did, for radfore. The author was an ntelligence sewreant n the Bitish Ar my in WWII, nd could describetha echnque well.

O'Donnell retired in 1996, but his books began about 1965 and are in many libraries and used book stores, or on the Net. I'm writing this not just for you, but for others who'll read it and have easier access to the books.

David Lindsey also wrote splendid murder mysteries, and relied on brand names. His Houston, Texas homicide sergeant Stuart Haydon carried a "Beretta",apparently a 9mm, probably a M-92SB, given when the books were written. THe best example of a gunfight in all fiction that I've read was in "Spiral" when Haydon used the Beretta to kill the man who'd just used a submachinegun to kill the detective's partner near an old home in Houston That' a terrific book, as are most of the author's novels. We both attended North Texas State University, but didn't meet until years latter, at a book signing.

Can you get Donald Hamilton's old series about fictional agent Matt Helm or Ian Fleming's James Bond books? Those have about all the detail the average reader (or editor!) wants to see about guns. Most book editors and publishers here are in New York City and they don't know much about guns and usually don't like them. The author is lucky to get in much detail at all. The exception is the techno-novel, like those by Tom Clancy, where much of the plot incudes high tech military planes, submarines, etc. He could insert more gun detail than most, because he was considered to have a mostly military readership or of men who like such details.

Do you plan to publish in English? You need to refine your grasp of the language. It must be perfect to write professionally. And you must be careful not to use US spellings or terms if you send the manuscript to an editor in the UK or in Sydney, Johannesburg, etc. British readers and editors are very sensitive to what they call "Americanisms". I found that out the hard way!

THERE ARE MANY sPELLING ERRORS HERE, BUT I AM FRUSTRATED AT TRYING TO CPRRECT THEM ON ThIS BOARD, WHERE MY TYPING IS CONSANTLY MESSED UP BY SOME TROLL ASPECT OF THE BOARD. mAYBE MALWARE? I CAN ALSO BARELY SEE MY CURSOR TONIGHT. sO, READ WHAT YOU CAN DECIPHER. sorry. I JUST CAN'T SPEND THE TIME TO CORRECT THE ERRORS.