On Researching For Fiction

Make a list of things you're sure you don't need to check.

Research them.

Okay, not everything.  If you have extensive personal experience (for example, of belonging to a particular gender,) you only have to figure out how your characters' experience might be different. 

And how their tastes could be very, very, very different.  One heterosexual man's red hot momma is another's lukewarm stepmother.  Some people who grew up in the country live there by choice; others prefer city life.

By the way, I mostly grew up in a state which many people assume is entirely covered with skyscrapers.  New York State isn't entirely urban. 

For that matter, New York City isn't entirely urban. 

And if you think you've seen the most urban portions on TV or in movies, those scenes might have been shot in a Canadian city.  "I've seen it in the movies so I know what it looks like" never works well.

New York is more uniform than some other states.  It has only four main dialects of English, only three of which extend beyond state borders.

I stopped reading one fantasy story when a weather expert said "It never snows in Hawaii."  (There was snow for Christmas in cities all over the world, including Honolulu.)  It does snow in Hawaii, at very high altitudes.  An expert would know this.

Why didn't the writer know it?  She probably thought "It never snows in Hawaii" was a no-brainer.