S. W. Raine

I’ve been doing lots of research for my novel during my editing phase to make the “contemporary” part of the contemporary/urban fantasy as realistic as possible. So I’m back with three more things I’ve looked up for Project Elementals 2:

(You can find part 1 here.)

Satellite Phones:

I credit Josh Gates from the show Expedition Unknown for what little knowledge I did have of satellite phones to begin with. He’d received an emergency call while filming the Columbus episode in season two.

One of the things I’d had to research was how they work. Having worked in the Connection Center in Walmart, I know a thing or two about cell phones. Satellite phones are pretty straightforward in that they can work in most remote locations—as long as they have direct line of sight (from an open sky) between the phone and the satellites orbiting Earth.

Another thing I researched was whether they’re banned or illegal to use. According to some sources online, satellite phones aren’t illegal in the US. Other sources say they are, and a few more say it depends. Satellite phones are difficult for the government to monitor or track, which makes them seen as tools for espionage or planning attacks.

According to some sources, Russia is one country that blocks access to certain satellite phone companies and has restrictions for others. I thought I’d written myself into a plot hole with this bit of info until I remembered Moses and Kamran are mercenaries, and they’d probably be using them illegally anyway. So the satellite phone scenes stayed.

Northern Lights:

Until very recently, I’d only ever seen the Northern Lights in photographs or on TV. On May 10th, we experienced some pretty intense solar flares that allowed us to see the Northern Lights all the way in Detroit, Michigan! So when I started seeing these gorgeous pics from my Facebook friends, I rushed outside… only to be disappointed.

We couldn’t see a thing. The sky was pitch black with a slight pinkish tint, and that was it. No vibrant ribbons, no greens or blues. I tried taking pictures of the sky with my Pixel 7 phone, but I wasn’t getting anything. My husband took a picture with his Galaxy phone and actually managed a decent pic! (See the pink hue with very faint green appearing in the bottom left?) But we weren’t seeing what others were posting about (including our friends 30 minutes away in Windsor, Ontario, Canada), so we chalked it up to light pollution.

But then a few days later, while scrolling Facebook, I see what appears to be a black-and-white image of the Northern Lights. The caption explained the misconception of the expectations of what the Aurora Borealis looks like to the naked eye and the science behind the muted pastel colors we see. And apparently, all my friends posting magnificent pictures weren’t seeing much with the naked eye either. The shots they were getting were all thanks to their cameras/phone cameras. So with a bit more research, I toned down the Northern Lights in my novel—but only slightly. Ferenc and crew were in Norway, after all!

Distance Between the Moon and Earth:

Traveling to the moon and back with help from a portal is one thing. But something traveling through outer space from the moon toward Earth is obviously not going to be instantaneous.

My villain had said five days, yet as I had written it, the event happened in far less time. And while that might work for the “fantasy” part of contemporary/urban fantasy, it definitely didn’t work for the “contemporary” part.

According to my research, it takes around three days for a manned mission to the moon. And obviously, spacecraft speed is insane. But for what I needed the research for, three days was plenty without severely slowing the pacing.

Something else I learned during that research: the time it takes to get to the moon isn’t the same as the time it takes to get back to Earth. The moon is still moving around Earth on an elliptical trajectory, so it can either take longer or not as long. Science!

And while doing research on the time it takes to get to Earth from the moon, I also had to research how long it would take to drive to Estonia from Norway in the middle of winter. Whew!

Doing novel research on satellite phones, the Northern Lights, and proper distance and time adds to your reading experience. I can’t wait to share more of my research with you!

Raine