Writing.Com General Discussion

If you are writing a non-fiction work, especially in the case of crime, if you are not the initial investigative journalist, then you may write facts and info, so long as you reference where you got the info from. In a book, you don't need to do Harvard referencing, just a list of references used in each chapter. Nowadays, this tends to appear at the back of the book.

Make sure you use your own words completely. With the rise of AI, people are more wary than ever, and accusations of plagiarism are on the rise.

If you are writing creative non-fiction, like putting words into people's mouths you did not directly hear, assigning motive, guessing actions, there is a fine line between non-fiction and libel. A trad publisher can look into that; if self publishing, I'd recommend getting legal advice first.

That's just my 2 cents. Sorry.