Kyle Michel Sullivan's Blog: https://www.myirishnovel.com/, page 89

Grunt work, today

I set up a new website. Very basic and straightforward. I had to because GoDaddy dumped my old one after they changed everything in their system. It was not easy to do. The names of the actions you need to set things up are completely different, and halfway hidden. GoDaddy is really geared more to you making your site a store for selling instead of just a relay to buy your stuff. If you want to check it out...
KMSCB

This thing is nowhere near what I want, but until I can figure out how to use their system...it'll do. I have all of my books listed and linked to where they can be purchased. Believe me, I'd have dumped them after this crap, but I have hundreds of dollars tied up with them that I cannot get back so I'm using it. Dunno if this will help sales any, but it is a necessity.
I also did more on the French dealers stuff, this morning. The UK leaving the EU has really messed up book and art dealers. They used to be able to transport books, art, photos and manuscripts between England and the Continent with relative ease; now it's a ton of customs work involved. And VAT charged on some item going into the UK, which is damn near impossible to get back once the items have returning to their originating country. 
Got a bit of reading done in Strong About it All, a book of interviews with women of Derry and the western rural areas. Talking about how rough things became in the early 70s, thanks to the Ulster Defence Association harassing Catholics. Their goal was to drive all Catholics off, and they had the backing of the British Army and the Royal Ulster Constabulary.
They used quiet forms of intimidation...like looking in the windows of people's home for spaces of time...and stopping cars to search them, even though they had no authority beyond a gun. Kind of hard to fight back against that sort of bullying when you're a woman surrounded by men, alone on an isolated country road with no one around to back you up.
I thought I'd lost this book, but it turned up mixed in with some of the larger books I had for Dair's Window. Very happy to have found it; it's hard to replace for a decent price.

Done, again...except...

Okay...this red pen edit of A Place of Safety is done, with lots of work to do as I input it. Most of the changes are in the first six or seven chapters, but I've also broken a couple of later the later one in half. Keep them from being too-too long. It's making for a lot of chapters, so I may rethink some of it...but we'll see. Depends on how much it gets expanded.

I still don't have Brendan established as tightly as I'd like. It covers six years of his life, so he's going to change some, thanks to events over which he has no control. From age 10 to 16, which is a lot for a child, but he's still soft-focus. Better than he was; just in need of further clarification. A smoother arc.

I'll try to work that out during the inputting, at least a little. But I also know I'm going to have at least one more, probably two more full drafts to do before this is over. Then maybe...maybe I'll open it up for feedback.

Blood Angel is proving to be a wash. Setting it up as book one of seven is not doing well. I might have been better off, sales-wise, using KDP, but I keep hearing horror stories of books being returned for credit and writers being told how to rewrite their stories. I wouldn't do well with that kind of nonsense being spat at me.

Of course, it would help if I spent more time doing publicity and sales for it, I'm sure. I don't really know how to handle that, and the successful authors I met online spend half their days doing nothing else. I actually asked one how he manages to find time to write, I saw him pushing his work so much, and his exhausted reply was, Don't ask. That makes me especially leery.

Ingram is still trying to ignore me over pulling How to Rape a Straight Guy from distribution. Customer Service's attitude is, We dropped it and that's all there is to it. No explanation. Nothing, after 8 years. Can't even get a response from them via their Instagram page. Irritating.

Bloody Sunday

I'm up to the chapter dealing with the British massacre of 14 civilians during a peaceful march on January 30, 1972...three days before Brendan's 16th birthday. He's part of the march and caught in the shooting, sees one boy shot in the back while running away, is almost shot himself, and is profoundly altered by it all. His first thought, after coming out of the shock, is to leave Derry...so starts making preparations.

He's trying to find out where Joanna plans to attend university so he can move there, but she's being indecisive. Maybe Queens, which would not work for Brendan, it being in Belfast and surrounded by The Troubles. Maybe St. Andrews, which Brendan thinks is in Edinburgh but is actually 35 miles from there, in Fife. The University of Edinburgh is a possibility because she has family who live close by, but she's definitely ruled out Trinity College in Dublin because the buildings are dingy.

Something that's bothering me is, there are hints coming out in their relationship that she is not as enamored of him as he is of her, and he's blinded himself to that. She almost seems to view him as a bit of rebel fun. Proving her independence to mommy and daddy, but he's not someone to take seriously as a boyfriend. Which I'm not sure will work for the story...and yet...I can't discount it.

Which I hate. Because he has her name tattooed on his arm, now, and that raises a complication unto itself.

That's not to say she doesn't care for him. She shows up at his shop a few weeks after Bloody Sunday to be with him and comfort him, and he takes her to the circle fort just across the border in the Republic and they talk and he begins to form a plan...get his passport, get a job on a passenger liner or freighter out of Cork, make money for a year and, once Joanna's ready for her university years, move to be near her. He'd send money home, as well, like so many or Ireland's youth did after leaving to find decent jobs off the island.

He knows she's safe from the hate on his side of the River Foyle, and this would free him, as well. So...

People are a pain...and so am I...

My intention was to get onto the next chapter of APoS, today, but I was asked to work on verifying the packing lists of some French dealers who are going to a book fair in London, in a couple weeks. I know just enough French to get myself into trouble, which is why this job came to me. So...I started going through them and...
It seems France did not get the memo that the UK is no longer part of the EU, so anything they ship there is subject to the UK's import rules and regulations. This doesn't matter so much for books; no duties or VAT involved, on those, and export is easy. 
However, Artwork, photographs and manuscripts, which used to also be easy to move in and out of the UK, are now subject to VAT -- 5% if over 100 years of age, 20% if under. Also, now all manuscripts must have an export license to leave the UK, even if they only came in for an exhibition. Same for any book valued at above the threshold of 65,000GBP. Not one of them really understood this.
The only proper way around that is to have them come in on a carnet, but what comes in has to go back out, and if a client wants to take an item they purchased with them from the fair, they cannot legally do so. It has to be returned to the dealer's address and shipped back out from there. Which NO dealer is really willing to put up with.
This is totally different from when the UK was part of the EU. Back then, dealers from the continent could bring books and such over in the trunks of their cars, if they felt like it. So long as they kept to the guidelines. But not no more.
So...I'm seeing aquarelles listed in the shipment, and I know they're watercolors. They might slip past the customs person handling the import...maybe...but if they are caught, the whole shipment can be seized for detailed inspection. Which can take weeks to do. Thus making all of the dealers in that shipment miss the fair.
After going through each list with painstaking precision, I sent the export agent in France a long email with my concerns. In French, though I added an English translation at the bottom just to be safe. Dunno why I specifically decided to do that, because his English seems to be pretty good. It just felt...polite. And fun. Sort of. I dunno.
But there went the day. Dammit.

I get too caught up...

I wrote myself out, the last couple of days, dealing with inputting notes I'd made for APoS and expanding other parts that needed more detail while clarifying areas that were over-written. I've also kept at the consistency issue. And this is just the red pen edit. I still have to input everything into a Word file then print it out to do another pass over.
Something I need to be careful about is not making Brendan too aware of the political decisions and actions being taken. He's 12-13 years old, here, and his focus is on repairing things for people, fixing up their home to be livable, and then building a relationship with Joanna that will endure despite her being Protestant and from an upper-middle-class family. His one goal is to be left alone by the growing trouble around him.
Which proves to be impossible. He gets caught up in the Battle of Bogside, all of which is told from his viewpoint. He helps by making of petrol bombs with a couple of his friends, keeping up with the news and gossip as best he can. It's a longer chapter but I don't want to break it up or remove anything. It all comes together, I think. Then follows the Celebration Fleadh and reconnecting with Joanna.
I made myself stop at the point where Brendan comes to realize his mate, Danny, has been abused by a priest and it's made him unstable. He'd been showing signs of anger and moodiness for a while, but once the priest was sent away, he grew steady. Brendan even used him to help with some repairs and such. But now it's 1970 and Brendan's just turned fourteen and is remembering things that pointed to the truth about Dany's instability. This is another long chapter but I do not want to break it in any way. So I'm going over it, again, tomorrow.
I sometimes wonder if I'm using telling this in first person as an easy way around much of the detail of the time. Brendan's thought of as simple-minded when really he's just focused and solitary. He hears much and says little. Thinks a lot but not in great depth. Is on the cynical side but still has hopes and dreams and prayers. I just hope I'm not being cute and coy instead of honest.
But I won't know till it's done, I guess.

Stephen King speaks...

 I have nothing to say, but he says it all...I've also read his book, On Writing

Moving right along...

I'm up to the People's Democracy March from Belfast to Derry at the beginning of 1969. I feel a bit like I skated through the last few chapters, but we'll see how this part goes. I've already reworked it and set it down many times, so this may be pretty much where it belongs. Oh, and this image shows the type of home Brendan is living in, at the moment.
A sub-theme that seems to be developing is Brendan wondering about his father's past. He knows very little about it other than he came from Belfast and was in an orphanage run by the church. And that it scarred the man in some way. He knows his father can weave elegant stories, but that's only because he was told so by one of his drinking buddies. Da never weaves the stories for his kids.
Not sure where that's going, yet. It just popped up and I'm sure the meaning will come to me, later. Right now, it's just the brutality of the man that matters, and Brendan's resentment of him and happiness that he's gone.
Something else that's worked in is Ma's fanaticism about cleanliness. Which becomes another problem between him and her because he just doesn't think about it and can wind up dirty without even trying, thanks to the repairs he does. He begins paying more attention when he sees Joanna for the first time and realizes he's filthy from having fixed a car.
I still don't feel like I have the tone or attitude or whatever of Derry, yet, but it's getting there. I think. Maybe after the next two drafts.
I've had friends tell me I'm never going to let go of this story...and they may be right. It could be my White Whale...or Winchester House. Who knows?

Guinness is the cure...

Took me damn long enough to find out that a single Guinness can realign my emotional and physical state and bring be back to the red pen edit of APoS. I'm through chapter five, and seeing it shift into a more realistic portrayal of people living in Derry at the time is making me feel even better. Just had hot tea and DPZ, today, but we'll see what happens tomorrow,

Oh...DPZ is Dr Pepper Zero, not some drug...though it is an addiction of mine.

I'm through APoS to the summer of 1968, then things were getting heated up. The civil rights groups had begun not only demonstrations but staging situations that brought attention to the plight of people needing homes in the Bogside. Sit ins. Moving a small caravan into the middle of a main road on a Saturday to highlight how John Wilson's family of 4 was living in something that was smaller then a walk-in closet, blocking traffic. Confrontation instead of asking and negotiating.

The next chapter leads up to the October 5th march...or the attempt of Catholics to march on that day. It was kind of a mess, to start with...but then the Royal Ulster Constabulary stupidly and viciously attacked the marchers with batons and water cannons, causing many to be injured while arresting others. All in front of news cameras. Showing them off to the world. And this is when things began spiraling out of the  control of Protestants.

In this part, I think I have things better aligned with how the world was, there. It's the first five chapters, where I'm setting up Brendan's family and relationship with his mother and the neighbors as well as his friends, that needed the most work. And still does. But now I'm focused on consistency.

Brendan's also revealed himself to be odd in comparison to other boys. He's not big on playing things like marbles and such, but takes pleasure in repairing items to the extent he gets so lost in it, he doesn't hear people who are talking to him. His best mate, Colm, does manage to drag into being goalie for their football matches because he can work out what the opposing team's players are doing to send a ball into the net...and keeps it out 99 times out of a hundred. But then...that's more like a problem he's solving than a game he's playing.

I already had this aspect of him suggested in there; now it's more overt. I just hope it's not tedious to read.

Baby steps...

Friday was a day of irritation with the world and growing depression, with what seemed like its continuance today. Concern about Ingram's sudden puritanical bullshit. Dealing with a possible information breach in my financial information...which turned out to have occurred through TransUnion because there's a small loophole in the security freeze setup that allowed those people to get some, not all, of my info. Just enough to spook me. Even though I put an information freeze on it. In which case, why bother offering that as an option? Tension headache. Belly ache. On and on.

I got locked down, mentally and emotionally, and honestly could not figure out what to do, for a while. Couldn't write, even in my journal. Just wandered through the internet, watched a lot of dog and cat videos...as well as videos made by two different couples where American women had married Italian men and how they were coping with the differences between Italy and the US in everything. Made cube steak and fires, enough for two, then ate it all and wound up having to take some Alka-Seltzer. Watched The Women for the umpteenth time and generally felt sorry for myself and depressed at my current position in life.

I finally said fuck it and had a Guinness. I'm not a big drinker, and I've had these cans of it for months. They have the little ball inside that helps it foam. Poured it into a tall one-time-salsa-jar I had...and within an hour I was feeling better. I wonder if maybe part of my problem was an iron deficiency.

I changed all my passcodes for credit cards and bank as well as some others I use a lot. Tried to set up 2FA authentication for signing in on a few but that got so screwed up I canceled it all. Decided if Ingram gets nasty I can keep my books going in ebook form; the PB and HC sales are 10% of my total so I can live with it.

The only loss would be my coloring book. Which I might be able to set up through a Patreon page. I know people who do that, and while my art isn't as good as theirs, it is a lot of wicked fun.

But best of all -- I got back to work on APoS. I went back over the first two chapters and added in some changes I'd come up with since the last time I was working on it...and now know I'll need to do at least three more drafts to make it clear and smooth.

To start, the family now lives off Nailors Row, not on, and I'm being nonspecific about that. Same for all locations alluded to. And initially I had it set up so neither Brendan nor his siblings knew of any uncles they had, but that was ridiculous. People in that town know everything about everybody back ten generations.

So he's now learned that his aunt in Houston is trying to make contact with the men, and has four of the seven. Ma, however, wants nothing to do with them because she feels they abandoned her and her sister to the mercy of the nuns in an orphanage. From what I've heard about those places, small wonder she'd hate her brothers' guts.

Shit...I'm having another Guinness, tomorrow.

Unsure what to do...

Okay, Ingram's not even responding to me, now, so I'm firing off a letter to the CEO, Shawn Morin, tomorrow, if I get no love at all. I want this mess explained and I won't stop until it is. My inner hard-head is running things, now, in defense of HTRASG, and it could get messy. They've already hinted if I get too demanding, they'll close my account.
Which leads me to a quandary. If they do, what do I do? Shift to Amazon? HTRASG and RIHC6, they will offer for sale, but not through KDP; already know that. And having been through two occasions where their puritanical nature has taken over and caused me all kinds of shit, I'm very leery of them.
So do I get printed copies and sell them through eBay? They're part of Amazon and just as picky. So do I set up my own shop? I'd rather not, because it could be expensive and I'm fairly certain I'd lose money on it. The vast majority of my sales are through Smashwords. Do I keep them all as available only in ebook? That seems to be the way this is going.
This has messed with me, big-time, focus-wise. And on top of it, a scammer apparently tricked one of the credit reporting agencies into giving them enough info about my credit cards to jolt me with a letter that looks like an official offer to cut the card debt in half. And they knew the exact amount of my cc debt.
Except...their name and address are not on the letter, nor is a signature; just an 800 number. And when I looked that up, it's to a company called Mini-C that has half a dozen offices spread about Chicago's suburbs. Probably people working out of their homes. Give us your cc number and we'll take care of everything.
No. Fucking. Way. I may be dumb but I ain't stupid. I don't think.
So yesterday and today were taken with Experian, Equifax and TransUnion as well as Ingram, and no writing done. I'm getting ticked off.