I was thinking… periodically I come across blog posts, or articles or whatever that talk about research put into fictional books. It’s true there are some great fiction novels that practically exude “author researched the heck outta this” and then there are others that exude “aw, come on, that would never happen”. My own personal style? I’m somewhere in between. As some of you know I love, luuuurve, love things having to do with American gangsters–usually old school gangsters of the Luciano and Capone sort. I also love the rich history of the FBI and other crime-fighting branches of the US Government. I also love the history of Chicago and the history of Nebraska (which have quite a long history of being connected). My family’s from Chicago, I’ve heard tons of interesting stories. I tried to throw some shout-outs, if you will, to those histories in my Downey series. BUT, I’m telling a story, a fictional story. I took some liberties. Quite a few liberties, as only the purists will know. *wink* I think that’s our right as authors, in essence to say, “Yeah, but what IF it were to happen this way?”

What was my point?

I have no real point (ha!) except to say I deeply enjoy when people discover/recognize my nods to history and real people but, yes, I did, on purpose, flirt with the “that would never happen”. That’s the point to telling a yarn…

 

Speaking of #RandomGen… did you know Al Capone’s older brother Vincenzo–“Jimmy”–lived in Homer, Nebraska? Yeah, for realsies. Went by the name of Richard Hart. And–get this–he was the town Marshall for a while.

I know, right?

Sometimes the truth really is stranger than fiction.

HAVE A FANTASTIC THURSDAY!

*smooches*

Gen