No this isn’t a story about Christmas shopping gone horribly wrong. This blog is about research and the writer. Never in my life did I expect to get up close and personal with a handgun until I wrote TOO CLOSE FOR COMFORT. But there came a point in the story when I realized my heroine, Joy, needed to learn how to use a gun, so in the name of research… Off I went (uncomfortably) to my local gun shop (filled with guns and ammo and other scary things) where I discovered they had a handgun gun safety class on Friday nights.  I was nervous about my first lesson and was sure I’d be out of place with the group. To my surprise, there was diversity in age greater than I’d expect in the class from young women and men to geezers and beyond. As the evening went on I felt a bit like Grandma-with-a-Gun as we handled many different types of guns and learned to shoot in front of each other. Turns out I preferred the Smith & Wesson 38 two inch revolver for the size and feel, and it suited my hand strength. Surprisingly, Joy in TOO CLOSE FOR…