Researching the Facts, Writing the Fiction: A Creative Writing Practice Study - Herself Alone in Orange Rain

Writing a novel about recent controversial and tragic events is a difficult, even potentially daunting challenge, for an author. The ethical considerations of including such facts in fiction often result in writers adopting the approach of applying a paper thin veneer of fiction to real events and people. In this article, novelist Tracey Iceton examines her approach to a creative writing project firmly rooted in reality, part two of her Celtic Colours Trilogy, the novel entitled Herself Alone in Orange Rain. The novel, which deals with real events from the Provisional IRA’s 1980s campaign and employs real people as characters, was the creative component of Iceton’s Creative Writing PhD thesis. Explaining both her decision to include real events and people in her novel and the research methods and writing practice used to construct a fictional text from factual accounts, Iceton exemplifies how she addressed both ethical and creative considerations in the writing of this novel. Drawing on the ideas of creative writing scholars (including, among others, De Groot, White, Watt, Neale, Steel and Southgate) particularly in relation to historical fiction, realism and representation, Iceton argues that, while such writing projects may always becontroversial to some readers, they are not inherently unethical as long as the writer is prepared to take responsibility for their creative production.