Kyle Michel Sullivan's Blog: https://www.myirishnovel.com/, page 120

Like wading deeper into a murky pond...

Well...I did a count of everything I've got through today, for APoS, and I'm at 238,197 words, total.
Book 1 -- Derry has 80,133
Book 2 -- New World for Old is 90,065
Book 3 -- Derry '81 is up to 68,199

And I'm still going. Still finding spots where the characters want to interact and add to the story. This part is proving tough because events are coming together where Brendan has to take a stand, something he's never wanted to do. He's always preferred to just be left alone to live his life...but that's not an option in this world or any other.
I'm fighting my old screenwriter habits, here, because they want to have certain moments happen at certain times, and that form also has certain scenes that are absolutely obligatory...but it doesn't work for this book. The entire thing is told through Brendan's perspective and his actions and events he lives. Nothing else matters. Just his experiences and what he thinks of them. And as much as the screenwriter in me wants that obligatory scene...and I know which one it is because I've cut it...it does not work.
But the damn thing is still trying to finagle its way back in, suggesting possibilities that are completely incorrect for the times and situations. And I hate films that don't pay attention to the reality they are in, even if it's a fantasy world...and APoS is not fantasy.
For example, I like Hitchcock's films, but that man is perfectly willing to ignore any laws of reality or timeline or even what's said earlier in the story in order to build his suspense. Take North by Northwest and the crop-duster scene. It's a classic piece of work in film history...but the ending of it, when the plane crashes into the oil truck? Completely ignores the laws of physics just so Hitch can have a shot of Cary Grant rushing away from the burning wreckage.

He did something similar during a plane wreck in Foreign Correspondent. As the plane's heading down to the ocean, the passengers fight to get to the back of it because the nose will hit the water, first. Um, centrifugal force will slam them all back to the nose, once the plane hits...but that gets ignored.

There are lots of films like that. I absolutely despised The Rock because it paid zero attention to how things would really work in order to have the script keep going. And wasn't Keanu Reeves in one where he outraced a nuclear explosion on a motorbike? Drives me crazy, because it's lazy, sloppy writing. I don't want anything like that in APoS.

Guess that makes me a truth freak...

Derry '81

Brendan has been living in Houston for more than eight years, but is finally called home to Derry because his mother is dying from cancer. He's using this as an excuse to get away from his Uncle, who has betrayed him.

The British and RUC are still looking for him, to question him about the bombing he witnessed, so he's sneaking in using a new identity his uncle procured for him, with an Irish passport, using the life of a young man who actually died in a farming accident to fake everything up.

No one knows he has no intention of returning to Houston.

--------

A friend of Aunt Mari’s worked at American Express in The Galleria, so she found me the best way home. I was set to fly out of Intercontinental on B-Cal via Gatwick, then to Glasgow, where I'd catch a short-hopper to Derry’s Airport on Logan Air. It was neither fast nor cheap, but I had savings enough to cover it and was assured it was comfortable enough to catch some sleep on the long haul across the water.
Uncle Sean offered to pay the ticket, he was so happy to be quit of me. That he deliberately made his offer in front of my aunt was especially grating, for he knew already I wanted nothing from him. In the more than three years since Mai's visit, I'd spoken to him only when necessary. Found an excuse to leave when he entered the room. And been naught but polite when he paid me my wages for The Colonel's.
Aunt Mari noticed, I'm sure, for little escaped her sharp eyes, but she said nothing. I liked to tell myself it's because she thought this anger between us would pass, but to be honest with myself, I knew she knew what was happening between her husband and myself. I had little doubt she knew his blackmail was the reason I'd returned to under her roof. How much else she knew didn't matter...at least, not to me.
Perhaps I should have fought him or argued with him or condemned him, treated him as the quietly brutal bastard he was. Using threats against others to get his way. At least my Da had been honest with his fists and words, for I could think of no time he ever threatened harm to any but the one he was looking at. It's funny how honorable he seemed, in comparison.
But Uncle Sean was Aunt Mari’s husband and, hate him as I might, to have caused them all that sort of disruption would have been a cruel way to repay her for all her kindness and generosity. Not merely since I’d come there but in the years before. But she was the one married to him, and neither believed in divorce as a solution to anything, so she heard not one cross word between us, and that is what counted. It settled me well enough to notice the B-girls now argued more with their father than each other, and that drove Aunt Mari to enough distraction.
When I turned down his offer, Uncle Sean softly sneered that I was independent to a fault. The first time he'd said that, I'd thought he meant it gentle, because even at the ripe old age of seventeen I'd wanted to be my own person. Beholding as little as possible to anyone else, and never mind what I had just been through. It was my way of reasserting myself, and since then I'd shown myself able to do it. Him repeating it now meant only that he had learned nothing about me in the more than eight years I'd been around him.
Aunt Mari had remained silent, but she caught his callous expression and her looks between us were as sharp as ever...and that was despite her being back only a day from her own trip over. She had flown into Shannon and taken a bus up the back way, and it had been quite the chore.
"No trouble up through Letterkenny," she'd said. "Oh, but the moment we reached the border. My little suitcase was rifled through as if I were carrying drugs."
"Or cash," said Uncle Sean, smiling.
"That they found in my purse, and didn't they make an issue of it?" she'd huffed, nearly shaking with anger. "Naught but two-thousand pounds, and that was only to help my sister have a decent wake and burial."
"You're lucky you had an American passport," I said.
Aunt Mari nodded. "Yes, those with Irish or British passports had it worse. Some men were physically searched. And the words used on the women. It would shame Judas. What do the British think they're achieving with this sort of nonsense?"
"Just reminding the little people of who once ruled the world," I chuckled. "They haven't the strength to admit they're nothing more than a tiny island of little significance."
"They're more important than you let on," said Uncle Sean.
"Aren't we all unto ourselves?" I shot back at him.
That is when the B-girls arrived from school, saw their mother was home and began their interrogation of her. Uncle Sean glared at me then carried her bag upstairs as I returned to the pool house.
So I paid my ticket, cashed all my savings into pounds, finished all my projects and took no more on, despite some very tempting ones. Those I could not sell I donated to Goodwill, and they were very appreciative.
Aunt Mari did come to the pool house, the day before I was to leave. I was packing my duffel bag when she knocked and entered, her face caught in worry and uncertainty. Her visit with Ma had been for near a month, and I could see it was hard on her. In the week or so since her return, she'd been even more quiet than usual and would sometimes let her mind wander while fixing a meal or washing a dish. Then after a moment she'd snap back. If I was around, in any way, she'd cast me a near glance, huff at herself and continue on. But she had yet to talk with me about anything that might be troubling her. This time, she was just checking to make sure I had everything I needed for the journey, as if I were going to an undeveloped part of the world. Which, in truth, was not far wrong.
She noticed the passport for the new me, which I'd deliberately left out for any and all to see, and saw some of the pound notes; the rest was in traveler's checks stuffed in a couple pairs of socks, in with my clothes. Not the safest method of transport, but not easily noticed.
"Ya've changed yer look," she finally mentioned. I'd had Everett cut my hair and put in reddish highlights.
"The less I look as I once did, the better," I replied.
"But it's been near nine years since ya came over," she said. Her voice was uncertain. "Surely they aren't still on about the...about the..."
The bombing.
The horror of it.
The leg twisting and twirling in the air as it whispered down to land before me.
The silence of it all.
I had to stop, in place, about to set the last of my socks in the bag, and deliberately will my mind back to nothingness.
Aunt Mari sighed and sat on the edge of the bed to say, "Bren, I should let ya know...when ya see Bernadette...yer mother is...well, it may come as a shock. Try not to show it."
I started breathing, again, and shrugged. "I figured as much."
"Mairead let Maeve know ya're coming..."
I froze, again. "She told Maeve it's me -- ?"
"No, no, no...not you, yourself. While she was there, she told Maeve it's a...a cousin coming, and I supported her."
I took in a long breath. Well, here it was. She finally let me know she knew all of it. That I was slipping back into the country, not as Brendan Kinsella, the fugitive from Her Majesty's justice but as some vague blood relation. And that led me to another understanding. Whether I liked it or not, Aunt Mari was full aware of what Uncle Sean had done. I'd been clinging to the idea she'd kept herself in the dark, but that was no longer possible. It meant she knew a great many other things I'd rather not think she knew. What all they were, I would not let her tell me. I did not want to accept the betrayal I felt at this. The anger. So best to keep it quiet and tucked away in the back of my mind. I could feast on it the rest of my life, if I so chose.
"When did Mai...I...I didn't know she'd gone," I managed to say.
"Her trip overlapped mine by a week. She had to go then; she's now five months on...with another set of twins, so is no longer able to fly."
That made me look at her. "I thought she and Tur were being careful. Not going to have more."
"No form of birth control is perfect. Tur's agreed to do something more...more certain, for himself."
I had no idea what she was talking about, so turned back to the last of my packing and said, "Well...that passport has my reborn name on it."
"Yes," she murmured. "Sean showed me before he give it to ya. Makes you legal, now."
Fuck, fuck, fuck, why did she say that? Why did she tell me that? Fuck.
I barely kept my voice even. "As he promised."
"Yes," she murmured, again. "How long do ya think ya'll be there?"
"No idea. Depends on Ma." I looked back at her. "Will you be coming for the wake?"
She shook her head, almost sad. "I've said my good-byes. No need to show off for others."
I made myself chuckle. "I've never heard a funeral referred to, like that."
"That's Ireland. People come from far and wide to say lovely things about the dead, and nothing bad, whether they knew them or not."
I nodded. "Yeah, I remember that from Da's wake."
"He was rough with ya, was he?"
"You know full well he was. With all but the youngest."
"I need to tell ya something more..." Her voice trailed off. I stopped packing and waited. It took her a moment but then she took in a deep breath and whispered, "I...I also met...spoke with...with yer grandparents."
That jolted me. "Grandparents?"
"Yer father's parents."
She knew of them? "Still...still alive, are they?"
"Yes. They live out by Toome and...well..."
My voice was sharp as I snapped, "Aunt Mari, I'm now twenty-five. You can tell me what you need to. No hemming and hawing, as you like to say."
She eyed me then took in a deep breath. "They needed to know about ya and yer background."
"The true or the false?"
"The one ya have now. In case they were asked. It's funny, but they were so easy to find. They were even visited by the RUC after ya came over. But since they knew nothing, they could tell them nothing."
"Wouldn't it have been better to keep it that way?"
"I...I know that, now," she said, weary to the bone. "But at least they believe ya're a cousin, on yer mother's side. And they won't be to the wake, either."
"Good. One less thing to deal with."
"But if ya wanted to see them, I could give ya their -- "
"I don't! I didn't even know of them till now."
"But ya've a whole world of uncles and aunts and..."
"And what? Did they come looking for me? For any in my family? No. You're the only one stuck with us. They've been silent my whole life. Not word one to any of us, that I know of. I see no reason to change that."
"Well...Kieran and Maeve are of a different mind," she said, rising. "They have been with them. Mairead has, as well, and I think Rhuari's visited, with his wife and their wain."
"Such is their choice," I growled. "Why're you telling me this, now? The night before I leave?"
"I wasn't going to, but then I began thinking and I...I thought ya should know what to expect. In case."
"Well...now I do. Is there anything else?"
"No."
She drew me into a hug. I let myself hug her back.
"When ya return," she said, "this will be yer home, again. All right?"
"When I return." Said without hesitation.
She nodded and left.
I stood in the middle of the room for perhaps half an hour, letting my anger subside. Da's parents...my grandparents...had let us live in poverty and neglect for all these years and were still being silent, hateful beasts about us. And he had brothers and sisters, but all were being fucking silent. It was as if we had to ask them to so much as notice us. Even now, as their daughter-in-law lay dying, they wanted nothing to do with her or their grandchildren and had to be approached on bended knee. The fury that built in me was vile and brought a sour taste to the back of my mouth.
Finally, I opened a beer and downed it. I'd have gone for a couple valium and a joint, as well, but I'd pulled back from all of that and had none. Dammit. Not to be clean or clear, but because I'd be having difficulty enough passing safely in Derry without adding drugs to the mix. So I opened a second beer, the only drug legally acceptable to a Derry Man, and after the first swallow had to admit Aunt Mari was right; they did need to at least know about the new me in case they were contacted by RUC or the Brits, again. The papers Uncle Sean had got me could be easily found out as fake, if someone decided to look deep. It's unwise to tempt fate.
Which was why I was not going to Derry as a relation to anyone there.
Which is why I was traveling as Jeremy Landau, instead.
---------
Jeremy is a Jewish friend of Brendan's, in Houston, and they look enough alike to be considered brothers. They also share a bond in that Jeremy was in the Yom Kippur war and killed men and saw his friends killed, much like Brendan saw on Bloody Sunday. So he's let Brendan use his passport and Bren has changed his looks to better match Jeremy's.

New World for Old

 

I've been working on the middle section of APoS, in Houston, and it's taken on a curious life of its own. Brendan's something of a fish out of water, but he's so traumatized by events in Derry that led him to be living at his Aunt's home near River Oaks, he's willing to settle in and build a new life, here. Only problem is, he's not legal.

Initially, that's not a big deal. He's white, young and quiet so there's nothing about him to draw attention to himself. And his method of making money is pretty much under the table. But he's begun to show a surprising streak of anger and stubbornness that I've not seen in him before. There've been flashes of it on a couple of occasions and it comes to a head after he's attacked for dating a woman who's a mixture of black and Cajun. (I don't think that makes her Creole, but her actual ethnicity is less important than she's not white.)

Doesn't help Brendan that he's not into the whole Irish-American thing of undying love for Mother Ireland. His uncle's bars, however, sell that as part of their meaning, and he nearly gets into a couple of fights with people who are too zealous about what needs to be done to end The Troubles. He's sick of the country and happy to be away from it...even as he has bouts of homesickness. He's also in the US under an assumed name, since the Brits and the IRA are looking for him. So the quieter he is, the better.

It's just, he keeps getting into situations that threaten to expose him, without meaning to...and which mirror the attitudes and situations in Derry, in vague ways. More and more this story entrances me.

Oh...the above photo is from a 1974 pamphlet called Houston Today, about the future of the city. 13th largest in the US, per the 1970 census.

Working on A Place of Safety ...

 ...And working and working. I'm going through it backwards to get myself better oriented to what's going on in this sprawling Russian Novel of a story. What's fun is, it's helping me get even more vested into Brendan's life and he's letting himself reveal more of himself to me. I now am adding more of an emotional connection to the events, for him.

There's one bit near the end that I was sure would stay exactly where it was, but it required Brendan to have a Hollywood moment...one I was really set on. Where he says goodbye for the last time to the girl he's always loved after imaging the kind of life he could have had with her...and it got dumped. It didn't ring true right then, and when I shifted it to later in the book, the Hollywood moment of goodbye was gone. A case of me killing a darling.

I know once it's done this book will be a good 300,000 words long...which is about half the length of War and Peace. Gone With the Wind is over 420,000. Anna Karenina is over 350,000. I Suppose could push to make APoS longer and better and deeper, I suppose...but it's up to Brendan; he's the one telling the story and he will decide when it's ready.

I finished A Society on the Run and find some things I'd put in the first part weren't right. I've already gone back and changed a few. Plus, writing the third part is showing me events that need to be added to the first part as well as the second...but that's how it goes.

I write what I'm told...and am loving it.

Details...

 I've got notes like crazy about all three sections of A Place of Safety, so I've been inputting them where I think they'll work best. They're partly details being added, but also moments to correct inconsistencies and set up things that will happen later in the story. They're making the areas I put them into lumpy and awkward, but next draft will be handling making the story smoother.

I'm still reading and absorbing as much of the social aspects of Derry, trying to make this as true to the place as possible. There will be a lot more notes as I go along, I'm sure, but this is the process. Just keep working it until you can't, anymore...then set it aside for a month or two and do another draft before you even think of asking for feedback.

I'm currently at around 230,000 words, and no question this will be a trilogy, because I'm nowhere near being done with adding to it. There's too much that needs to be addressed, and I know what I wrote about Bloody Sunday is going to double, once I work out the final details of where Brendan is, during the slaughter and what he could see.

I'm watching an old British sitcom I used to enjoy, To The Manor Born, with Penelope Keith as a high-handed wealthy widow who loses her ancestral home to the owner of a grocery store chain and how they get along, together...and don't. She is remarkable. I saw it on PBS in San Antonio before I moved to Houston, so didn't get to see all the episodes. Now they're on BritBox and I'm enjoying them. Could do without the canned laughter, but it's fun.

And I feel like posting a gratuitous pretty-boy image...so this could be Everett, a gay friend of Brandan's from Houston (Section 2)...

BTW, the paperback of Hunter will be available for sale through Amazon on Friday, 20 November. Finally.

Brendan is arrested...

 I'm jumping back and forth in APoS tying up inconsistencies and adding bits. I've got one section done the way I want it in Derry '81. Brendan was almost found out by British soldiers who stopped him, but he was able to talk his way out of it. However, they're suspicious and now know where he's staying and keeping watch on the place, so he's sent word to an old friend who's IRA, seeking help.

----

Early the morning of the next day, I was in the kitchen sharing a pot of tea with that little girl, Daria, Mrs. Haggerty's grandchild staying with her as her mother set up a new life in Galway, and she was handling it in a very proper manner, too. Across from us sat her little brother, Liam, fascinated with us to the point of total silence, as was the feral cat sitting at the back door waiting for his morning milk. Why Mrs. Haggerty gave it to him was beyond me; he was hardly a beauty nor had he a genial temperament, but it was money out of her pocket, not mine.
“White or dark?” Daira asked with deep seriousness. She was exceedingly pleased I’d stopped pacing to join her. Jimmy had left for university an hour ago, and now it was past seven and I was desperate for word from Colm, but my nervousness was achieving nothing so I forced myself to take a few breaths and sit at the kitchen table with her.
“White, please,” I said.
“Milk first or after?”
“After,” I replied.
“Sweet?” she continued in the same manner as she poured.
“Lightly so,” I smiled.
She put in half a teaspoon. Less than I was used to, but I was finally so enjoying the innocence of the moment, I didn’t care. I was feeling confident because it was long past time when the Paras or RUC would come busting in to arrest me, if they were interested. They liked to do that by 4 am, so as to cause as much disruption as possible. Now it was full light out and I was still here, wearing naught but my sturdiest jeans and a flannel shirt, socks on but no shoes, yet, and playing homemaker with a girl who so reminded me of Maeve, you’d have thought we’d gone back in time.
Christ, the times I’d sat at our table as a wain, quietly letting Maeve feed me tea made from bags well-used, already, and bits of toasted bread to act as biscuits, even after Ma had done with dinner and we’d, yet again, had not quite enough to fill us. How old would I have been? Nine? Ten? And already aware of the limitations of the adults in the world. I think then’s when I got to where I preferred my tea light and on the weak side.
Aunt Mari’d told me when she finally got some down me, not long after I’d come over, it’d been strong enough to set off a bout of diarrhea in me. She’d made it weak from that point on, and I’d absently sip it, myself, holding it like it was gold. I remember none of it, but it sounded true.
Daria offered me neatly-toasted bread with butter and jam off a chipped plate -- my, but weren’t we doing well? -- and I took half a piece so she and Sean could enjoy the three left. Then I sipped, and the tea was strong enough to pull out your teeth if it so chose, but a taste of the jam settled it on my tongue.
It was just us there; Mrs. Haggerty had run down to a neighbor's to fetch an egg for breakfast, and I'm sure they were having a quick chat. I was just hoping I could be fed before Colm sent word. I’d no idea what would happen with me after this point, but then I’d never had much of a plan for my life. Just work and marry and grow some wains of my own and treat them better than Da and Ma had treated theirs.
True, it wasn’t a very ambitious goal for myself, but it had pleased me to aim for it. To just accept that I was never the type who’d cure cancer or write great books or even stand for office. When Father Jack and I had been talking, he’d said more than once I was not living up to my potential, as though it were my duty to become better than I wanted to be. Such ideas made little sense to me and seemed at odds with the notion of self-determination we all supposedly have. Apparently that was only if you did what those who considered themselves your betters felt you should do. And so my focus on my own path, with disregard for the opinions of people like Father Jack, had set me into the little box of weakling and coward. And I hadn’t cared, for if things had not gone so horribly wrong with Joanna, one day I’d have asked her to marry me...and live with me in a whole new world away from these biting, clawing, vicious animals who claimed to be men. And I saw nothing wrong with that being all there was to me.
I absently touched the tattoo of her name. I’d done nothing like it for Vangie, for fear that would jinx us. And look at what good that did. I sighed, finally accepting the reality that there is no corner of the world safe from the howling mad dogs of self-righteousness. And people with dreams like mine were little more than meat for them to gnaw upon and feed to the just-as-vicious young they were breeding and --
Pounding on the door jolted me.
Liam jumped, terrified, but Daria instantly turned to him and said, “Now Liam, don’t be such a baby. It’s just the Paras come lookin' and they’ll be gone again, shortly.”
Liam huffed and looked at me with accusation, and it cut into me. A child of seven comforting a child of three, and both knowing what a knock at the door meant. That was not right. That was perfect evil. And all because of me. So I smiled at them, in comfort, and quickly rose.
“It’s all right,” I said, grinning to hide the sinking of my heart. “I’ll answer it.”
As I strode down the hall to the door, another pounding began so I called, “Hold on, hold on,” in my best twang. That voice gave the Haggertys at least a little cover against knowing who I truly was.
I opened the door just as a stocky Para was about to use his rifle butt, and I slipped into to Todd’s attitude and snapped, “What the hell’s wrong with you? I said I’s comin’!”
I thought for a second he was going to shift the butt to my head, but another man stepped forward, one I’d not seen before.
“Are you Jeremy Landau?” he said, another true Brit.
“That’s me.”
“Let me see your passport.”
Already a crowd was growing and this was giving off the feel of ugliness, with the hate in their eyes, so I handed it over without hesitation, knowing that’s the last time I’d have my hands on it. I knew Jeremy was no fool; the second he was called he’d know something had happened and would step back long enough to find out what was going on. As for Aunt Mari and Uncle Sean, I hoped they could stick to the story they’d put in place for if ever the day came that I was found out. So right now my one concern was for minimizing the Haggertys’ troubles.
“I’d invite you in,” I said, keeping the twang, “but this ain’t my place so -- ”
“No need. You’ll come with us.”
“Wait, Mrs. Haggerty’s not home, so I gotta wait till she gets back and -- ”
“What’s this?” It was herself bolting from the house two doors down, a cloth holding eggs in one hand, another woman right behind her and just as angry. “Mr. Landau, what’s this?”
“It’s nothin’, Mizz Haggerty,” I said. “These gentlemen just want me to go clear somethin’ up -- ”
“You bloody Brit bastards,” she snarled, “he’s an American. Just because you think you can treat us like this doesn’t mean you can the whole world!”
“By the saints,” someone added, “he’s American?!”
“The fuckin’ English!”
More women and children were coming out, and I began to wonder if this was another method of pushing back against the Paras -- surround them with loud angry females to confuse the issue and dare them to raise their guns. But this time even a quick look at their weapons showed me we’d not have a repeat of the night at Ma’s, for the riots of the last weeks had put them too much on edge to be willing to back down peacefully.
So I turned to Mrs. Haggerty and her mates and said, “Ladies, it’s all right. Thanks. I don’t mind goin’ with ‘em. I’ll just call the ‘Merican consulate from their office and get everything straightened out in two shakes of a lamb’s tail. It’ll be fine.” I turned back to the man in charge with a smile and added, “It’s just a little misunderstandin’, right? Don’t want no trouble here.”
I honestly couldn’t tell if he was a commander or captain or just a top sergeant -- but at least he was smart enough to look around at the noisy seething crowd, hold his tongue and nod. He pointed to the closest of two Saracens and said, “In here,” then begrudgingly added, “Please.”
I was about to ask if I could get my boots but the look in his eyes warned me not to do a damned thing more but what he’d asked, so I let two of them lead me around to the back of the first beast, in tandem. It was misting and my socks were soaked the moment I stepped from the door. The first para opened the rear door as three others kept close watch on me and the rest made for the second Saracen, the women still calling all of God’s curses down on them.
But as I was about to get in I noticed movement from above, like an arm waving from behind a chimney, and looked up to see a single, dark, perfectly-shaped brick softly hurtle over the roof top to slowly, slowly curl downward, downward, downward, twisting and spinning like it weighed nothing as it whispered closer and closer, a thing of such remarkable beauty and grace floating in the air as if it were weightless, growing larger and larger and taking a form of danger and I gasped and turned away from it because I thought it might hit me but instead saw it slam onto the bonnet of the Saracen behind me and ricochet into the chest of a para that was keeping watch on me.
He cried out and collapsed and his mates swung into full battle mode and the once-growing crowd of women burst apart like petals falling off an open rose in a brisk wind as they scrambled back to their homes, dragging their children behind them while more stones came pelting down on the Brits.
And on me.

Laziness ensues...

 I didn't do jack shit, today. On anything. My mind just slammed headlong into a brick wall and I could not figure out a course of action to take to get around it. So I sat at my laptop and surfed the web and argued with some idiots about the election and achieved nothing.

Maybe this is a good thing. I dunno. I just know right now I'm feeling very lazy and unfocused. I could have continued reading A Society on the Run. I could have dug into any of my dozen of other books on Northern Ireland. I could have updated a section of book one of APoS to reflect ideas I had, yesterday. But no.

Well...not totally nothing. I did seek out images of a porn star named Phenix Saint. He'd be a good illustration of Vermin in Hunter. If I ever do work up an adult coloring book. I'd just need to make him blond. He falls into working with Hunter, in Book One, fulfilling orders for men. He winds up getting betrayed at the end of Book Two because he's grown lost in the game.

Of course, he turns up later, ready for revenge...but things don't go as planned, as usual in my books.

Slippery in meaning...

 I'm finding what I've written for A Place of Safety is extremely simplistic and shallow. I glide past serious moments with the barest of emotional connection, which isn't really bad. I know I'll be reworking the whole set of books over and over and over until they begin to take shape. Until I find a way to delve into their meaning.

And I do mean that in the plural. These three sections are separate books. The first one -- Derry -- is over 77,000 words long, and I have a lot more to do with it. The second one -- Houston -- is nearly 88,000 words. And the last one -- Derry '81 -- is working its way up to very nearly the same length. But it will be needed to get the full impact of the story, overall.

While on the train coming home, last night, I realized that there are moments in this I'm not paying full attention to. For example, in Derry, Brendan's brother-in-law, Terry, is grabbed during internment, as is Brendan. Terry is brutalized by the British in their methods of torture, trying to prove he's IRA. He isn't, but that's immaterial. Brendan is let go fairly quickly because he looks so much younger than 15 years old.

When Terry's freed, he has little more reaction to what happened than, "We're leaving this country." He wants to take his wife, Mairead (Brendan's older sister) and their kids to Canada...and it just sort of happens. No emotional charge to it.

But...if he's brought out nearly broken and Mairead has to make decisions, that changes the whole dynamic. She does all she can to help her husband heal. And when her older brother, Eamonn, barges into her decisions and argues against them leaving, she kicks him out of their flat. Becomes a lot more interesting.

It's the same with Derry '81. I'm skating through some very intense moments just to get to the end. Next pass will be to find ways of making everything more dangerous and true.

That's the fun part...

Another step closer on a 5 mile yourney

 I know very time I read through what I've written on A Place of Safety, I should think I'm one step closer to being done. But I've still got miles to go before this book is in decent enough shape to even show to anyone for feedback, let alone publish. And I have dozens of books on the subject still to read through to get the true feel of the area...well, as true a feel as possible, considering I never lived there. Guess I'll be doing my usual slog of writing and rewriting and re-re-writing and on and on till I can't do a thing more.

It's been 10 months since I last looked at this part of the book. I won't be handing it out quickly, not at that rate. Probably not for at least another year or so. I'm still digging into the characters and how to deepen them and make it say more than this simple string of events can.

Not like I need to push so much, since they're fleshing themselves out, interesting. What makes it difficult is how Brendan is in a city that's thousands of miles from home and he has no way to know what's really going on except through snippets he catches on the news and letters sent by his sister in Toronto, who can't say much because they don't want to give away where he he's hiding.
I'd also forgotten about a number of things I added when finishing the first draft. Things I need to put not only in Derry '81 but also slip into book 1, so they start to pay off in book 2. Brendan's showing he's got a bit of his father's temper and cruelty, throughout, as well. He's become more complex, to me.
I'm happy there's forward movement on this, now, even if the task is daunting...

The joys of rewriting...

I'm going through book two of APoS, the section set in Houston, and it's glib and surface and easy, just laying out a line to start building on...and I'm already building on it. I've added nearly 1600 words, putting it over 86,000 words long...and I'm finding aspect of it I'd forgotten about...well, I actually had to dig back into the compartments I'd slipped them into and re-familiarize myself with them.

I'm back to thinking each part of APoS should be its own book. They'll be friggin' long enough, if I do go deeper. That or I'm cutting a lot and I HATE cutting. What winds up in the story is there for a reason; sometimes it just takes me a while to see.

Of course, I could be off in the wrong direction, here and there. When I was writing The Vanishing of Owen Taylor, I worked up an ending that would have been great for a Hollywood movie but jolted the book...and my MC, Jake, agreed. It became super Jake saves the day instead of Jake just finally losing patience with all the people who claimed to be helping him and kicking them out of the process. Then taking over, completely. On his own. No one else in the know until absolute need.

That meant dropping about 60 pages of work...around 12-14,000 words...but it was hundred times better. It led me to a scene I hadn't expected and damn near got Jake killed. I got a couple serious compliments on that scene, as well.

I love when my characters and stories surprise me...