Tag Archives: #Czechia

My Amazing Research Trip: Day One

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In May, my husband Will and I travelled to Karlovy Vary, Czechia, to research my novel-in-progress, which is set in that spa city on the brink of World War One. A few months before the trip, I emailed the Karlovy Vary Municipal Library and the Karlovy Vary Museum, explained my project, and asked their advice on how to prepare for my four-day visit.    Librarian Kateřina Krieglsteinová recommended that I search the library’s online catalogue and send her a list of books that interested me so she could have them ready when I arrived. My first morning in Karlovy Vary, she presented me with a stack of twenty-one books, none of which are available to me in North America. 


Will and I poured through the books and quickly dealt with a half dozen either because we could grab the pertinent information easily or we decided the text was too dense to explore during our limited time. Most of the books were written in Czech. While my maternal grandparents immigrated to Canada from (then) Czechoslovakia after WWI, I don’t speak the language. 


Translation apps are a godsend and old photographs speak thousands of words.   

Kateřina let me take the remaining books to my hotel. Somehow, in the midst of my other research and touring, I managed to peruse them all during my next three days — who needs sleep? I took over 250 photographs of text and historical pictures that portray the city during the era of my story.  


After lunch that first day, Will and I met with historians David Čech, Jan Nedvěd, Lukáš Svoboda, and Lukáš’ dog in their office in an apartment building separate from the Karlovy Vary Museum. We spent almost two hours talking about life in Karlovy Vary (aka Karlsbad in German) during the Golden Age of the Great Spa Towns of Europe. Eleven of those towns including Karlovy Vary are now a transnational UNESCO World Heritage Site. 

 
At the end of our productive talk, I thanked the historians for giving me their time. They said it was part of their job to assist anyone interested in the town’s history. I further imposed on their generosity by leaving them a bunch of additional questions. Since my return home, David has sent me detailed replies that will make my story more authentic. 


Next, we checked into our spa hotel and scurried back to the library in pouring rain for my 5:00 pm informal talk with library readers. Kateřina had arranged for a translator and created posters in Czech and English to promote the event. 

We agreed on a question-and-answer format. Kateřina posed questions, the translator restated them in English, I replied, and the translator repeated my answers in Czech for Kateřina and the audience. I’m afraid I made the translator’s job difficult by rambling on rather than pausing in the middle of my answers. Being translated is an acquired skill.    

 
To my surprise, Kateřina had purchased two of my novels online for the library. I donated a third book, and now my novels live overseas in the Karlovy Vary Library. One attendee had already read my latest novel, A Killer Whisky, and had purchased one of my earlier books, which she asked me to sign. 


I was also surprised to learn that the Karlovy Vary library is administered by the city’s Tourism Information Centre. Kateřina told the tourism director about my project, and he invited me to his office for coffee. He explained that their main markets for long-term spa visits are Czechs, Germans, and Russians living in Germany. When my novel is published, he would like to arrange for a Czech translation to encourage interest in longer stays. Would I be open to this? 


Wow! I’d assumed I was writing this book for my usual English-speaking-largely-Canadian readers.  Translation would extend its reach. I said I’d do my best to make this happen.  

You can read the Karlovy Vary Library’s write-up about my event in English thanks to their translation pop-up feature. https://mestskaknihovnakv.cz/cs/aktuality/v-pujcovne-pro-dospele-jsme-se-setkali-s-kanadskou-spisovatelkou-susan-calder

Muddling Through a First Draft

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Last summer, I started a new novel. I got half way through the first draft by Christmas and set the manuscript aside for the holidays. My New Year’s Resolution is to finish the first draft this spring.

The novel’s story begins in Czechia aka Czech Republic three months before the start of World War One. I chose this time period to make use of the research I’d done for my last novel, A Killer Whisky, which was set during the final days of WWI. This era also ties the new book to my maternal grandparents, the inspirations for my new story. They emigrated from Czechia (then part of the Austria-Hungary empire) shortly after The Great War and settled in Canada. 

Matous and Emilie Slovacek

Unlike A Killer Whisky, this novel-in-progress isn’t a whodunit mystery. A murder will take place – I think – but it won’t happen until later in the story. My original plan was to kill off the victim at the book’s one quarter mark, prompting my protagonist and her friends to escape to North America to avoid the police and imminent war. But as my writing of the story progressed, I didn’t want to rush the killing and stumbled upon a different first quarter turning point. My characters remained in Czechia and hatched a criminal plan, but it still didn’t lead to murder half way through. Their prospective victim is also becoming fun, in an evil way, and I’d like to keep him in the story.  

Before my Christmas break, I outlined enough future action to take place in Czechia that I’m pretty sure my characters won’t cross the Atlantic Ocean before the end of the book. There are advantages to keeping them in one location. Sending them elsewhere would mean creating a new supporting cast and researching another historical setting. Instead, I can develop my existing support characters more deeply and give them larger roles in the story.

My Czechia setting of Karlovy Vary will also need to carry the whole book. A positive will be the opportunity more richly describe Karlovy Vary (Karlsbad in German), a beautiful spa city known for its hot springs and healing mineral waters. Goethe, Beethoven, Chopin, and Peter the Great were frequent visitors. A negative is that I don’t live there. I visited Karlovy Vary thirteen years ago but feel a need to return to check out the locations in my story and learn more about the spa city’s history. 

So, this spring, I’ll be adding a week or so in Czechia to a holiday in southern Germany. In Karlovy Vary, I’ll soak in some spa baths, drink the (extremely salty) mineral water from a sippy cup, visit a history museum, trace my characters’ footsteps on forested hill walks, stroll the river promenade, dine in the luxury hotel murder site, and absorb the city’s baroque architecture that hasn’t changed since the era of my story.  Not a bad incentive to finish a first draft of a book.

Sippy Cups for sale
Drinking from a sippy cup