Folks in Ireland do not dress that differently than those of us in the USA, but there are some differences based on culture and climate.  Again, for authenticity it was important in Murphy’s Troubles that the characters be dressed appropriately.

The protagonist, Ian Murphy, is aloof, traditional and mildly eccentric and I wanted his clothes to reflect his personality.  In the novel this is best expressed when he goes hiking.  He has very specific clothing he wears for his outdoor excursions.

Weather can change quickly and dramatically in Ireland, especially along the coast and on the Dingle Peninsula where Ian Murphy spends a great deal of time hiking.  Ian wears a Dobbs walking hat, leather boots, a vest, a day jacket and a rain jacket.  The vest and day jacket are worn for warmth and to protect from the wind.  The rain jacket could also protect from the wind if it didn’t rain.

Small details such as how a character dresses can show us something both about the character and their occupation.  The bartenders in Murphy’s Troubles wear starched white shirts, without a tie and creased black dress trousers.

Researching detail such as clothing makes the writing more authentic too.   

When writing about a specific country and time period it is very important to be authentic, especially about the details of daily life.  It’s the snippets of detail on food, clothing, beliefs, customs, traditions, history, and geography. that give the reader an image they can create in their minds as they read.  I revel in readers who tell me that the scenes in Murphy’s Troubles are realistic, credible and have a movie like quality.  That is key to my style writing.

I was once told in a critique group that no Irish person outside of Northern Ireland would drink Bushmill’s whiskey.  I believed that person and removed all references to Bushmill’s in my manuscript.  When visiting Ireland in 2008 all the pubs in Dublin, Killarney and Limerick served Bushmills.  Being an ignorant American I asked the barman about serving the Northern Ireland whiskey.  “Why not serve Bushmill’s, its whiskey isn’t it?”  That’s the last time I took advice from any critique group about the details of daily living in Murphy’s Troubles.

I wanted my protagonist, Ian Murphy, to show he had been successful as a writer by some of his habits.  While in Ireland I learned the most prestigious whiskey is Midleton which is distilled in Midleton, County Cork.  The distillery was originally owned by two brothers named Murphy, so Ian Murphy became one of the descendants of the distillery owner.  Ian Murphy can afford the whiskey and has a family connection, it was perfect.

For research, Google is the perfect tool.  I was able to find learn about traditional meals in various regions of Ireland.  I had read that often potatoes are served in three different forms at an Irish supper.  I thought that was historical but again my trip to Ireland proved eye opening.  We went to a traditional Irish restaurant in a rural area near Killarney.  My meal came with mashed potatoes, several boiled potatoes and fries and a small piece of white fish – no other vegetables.  It was a lesson.

All of the meals in Murphy’s Troubles are authentic and you can find them served in pubs and restaurants throughout Ireland today.

I used several methods to choose the names for the characters in Murphy’s Troubles.  I didn’t want to make Dublin the setting of the novel because it was too common for an Irish story.  The main setting is Cork which is a very international city surrounded both by hills and a port.  County Cork was the home of Michael Collins and the county has a reputation for being rebellious.  I researched the most common surname in County Cork and it was Murphy, so the protagonist is Ian Padraic Murphy.

My son’s best friend is John Doyle so I chose ‘Doyle’ as the surname for Ian’s best friend growing up in Cork.  I read a story about Ray Bradbury when he spent a summer in Ireland working on the screen story for the movie Moby Dick.  He was given a driver, Timolty.  Timolty was such a unique Irish name I thought it was perfect so Timolty Doyle became Ian’s best friend.

For all the other characters I researched Irish male and female first names and surnames.  Many names in Ireland have been Anglicized but I wanted the characters of my book to have original Irish names.  In my travels I’ve learned that names are common to their country of origin and it made the novel more authentic.  I didn’t use the English version of a name.

However, I mixed the spelling of names between Irish and English.  The Irish spelling of ‘Ian’ is ‘Ion’ or ‘Eion’.  I worried that readers wouldn’t understand and settled on using the English spelling.  For some of the minor characters, especially when their setting was in rural Ireland, I used the strictly Irish name with the Irish spelling, again to make the novel more authentic.

I believe names are important and one hint about a character’s traits is found in their name.  For example, “Murphy” means warrior and in his own way Ian Padraic Murphy is a warrior during The Troubles.

After high school my son, Tim, and his best friend John Doyle (called just ‘Doyle’ ) saved enough money for a trip to Europe.   Doyle had relatives living in Ireland and their plan was to make their farm home base and make excursions from there.

The plan worked for about two months, they tried to get green cards to get odd jobs and extend their stay.  The world was in the midst of an economic depression and Ireland didn’t feel the need to have two Americans wandering their island taking the odd job.  As a result they ran out of money.  Once day I received a call from Tim, he needed $500 to get a flight home.  I wired him the money and within a week he and Doyle were back in Wisconsin looking for a job.

As part of his thank you for bailing him out of Ireland, Tim brought me a stack of Irish newspapers.  He thought I would enjoy reading papers from Ireland.  I’ve never understood what gave him that notion but it caused a euphoric moment for me.  In 1997 Ireland was still a year away from approving the Good Friday Agreement that ended The Troubles.  The papers carried stories of civil violence and atrocities.

One story in particular caught my attention.  A ten year old girl was maimed in a ‘peace zone’ in Belfast.  The government had created areas between the walls that separate Catholics and Protestants that were neutral zones where no violence was to take place.  Neither the Protestants nor the Catholics accepted the peace zones because they were imposed on them from the British government.

From that story I began to imagine what it would feel like for a family to have their daughter injured while just playing outside – being in the wrong place and the wrong time.  That became the major incident that I built the story of Murphy’s Troubles around.

In the front cover of Murphy’s Troubles in the Appreciation Section I thank Tim for bringing me those newspapers.