Deciding on a title for my debut novel was painful.  The kind of pain you experience of having your wisdom tooth pulled without the benefit of Novocain.  I wanted the title to give readers a clue about the story and plot.  I researched the title of both fiction and non-fiction books about The Troubles in Ireland.  Most of the books had “troubles” in the title or “IRA”.  I thought it would be disingenuous to use a title like that.

Next, I decided to try brainstorming.  I have participated in many brainstorming meetings in my previous life in management.  I enjoyed those sessions and was always surprised with the outcome.  I took a blank piece of paper and wrote down every title that came to mind.  Brainstorming was designed to be a group activity and brainstorming by yourself lacks creative exchange and interaction.  However, I filled several pages with titles but wasn’t satisfied.

Frustrated and anxious I stuffed the pages of titles in my briefcase and forgot about them.  Putting my brainstorming titles away meant I relegated my problem to my subconscious.  One thing I’ve learned about myself as I’ve pursued writing full time is that my subconscious is a hotbed of creativity.  I don’t know how it works – but it works and I’ve learned to trust it and listen to it.

One evening as I went to bed I was reviewing potential titles in my mind.  It’s like counting sheep to get to sleep.  In a dream I had a conversation and he told me the title was Murphy’s Troubles.  He explained that the book was about his troubles in life and the period of Irish history referred to as The Troubles.  It was simple. 

Chapter One of Murphy’s Troubles reveals all of Ian Murphy’s flaws.  The first three chapters take place in 1996 as intentional foreshadowing.  Chapter Four begins in 1968 with Ian Murphy attending Trinity College.  His best friend, Timolty Doyle, has made a life changing decision and wants to share it with Ian.

Ian has several tragic flaws.  He is a recluse, preferring to spend his days alone writing.  People make him uncomfortable.  In the fiction world he creates through his writing he lives through the characters in his imagination.  He is close to only two people, Kieran Fitzpatrick and Mickey O’Shay.  Ian suffers from depression although he denies he has any mental health problems.  His depression is fueled by incessant drinking especially his favorite whiskey – Midleton.  He regularly consumes at least half a bottle of whiskey every evening as he reads.  He’s dependent on the whiskey to get to sleep.

Ian finds it difficult to trust others and isn’t willing to share his beliefs, thoughts and feelings with others.   He even keeps his activities in the Provisional Irish Republican Army (PIRA) a secret from his only friend in Cork, Mickey O’Shay.  When he does find someone to love (infatuation) he keeps it secret from his friend Kieran Fitzpatrick.  When Kieran learns Ian has a relationship with an investigative reporter he is furious both because Ian kept it a secret and because it jeopardizes Ian’s role with the PIRA.    

Ian is consumed by destructive anger.  He feels out of control and unable to influence events in the “real” word which he expresses as anger toward both himself and others.  His anger is both explosive and self-destructive.

These tragic flaws converge to create an emotional volcanic eruption as Ian attempts suicide in Chapter One by driving his car into a British barricade.  

Eileen Donohue is a respected investigative journalist in her mid-thirties with two children and a husband who is an aspiring politician.  In the Cork community the Donohue’s are considered a “power” couple.  However, with the stress of two professional careers and two children their marriage has become an empty hull without love.  Their commitment to their professions leaves them without time, energy or interest in maintaining a strong marriage.

Eileen is attracted to Ian Murphy through his writing and she decides she must meet him by taking an adult learning course on literature from him at University College Cork.  Eileen is both selfish and self-centered.  She has no guilt in actively pursuing a relationship with another man and emotionally abandoning her marriage.

Middle aged bachelor Ian Murphy is fascinated with Eileen and astonished with her interest in him.  In a short time Ian is infatuated with Eileen which he believes is love.  Ian wants Eileen to divorce her husband so they can marry.  Eileen reminds Ian she is Catholic and Catholics don’t divorce.  Eileen needs Ian’s adoration and professed love but doesn’t make the same emotional commitment, she never considers it.

Eileen demands their relationship remain a secret and goes to extraordinary lengths to be discreet and secretive.  She fears the consequences to her career if her relationship with Ian is exposed.

Eileen accidently discovers handwritten drafts of what she learns are the Green Book.  Her curiosity and sense for a sensational investigative story drive her to expose Ian’s secret involvement with the Provisional Irish Republican Army.  She struggles with the decision to betray her lover or keep his secret.  Her selfishness and need to be the preeminent Irish investigative reporter have unintended consequences for Ian Murphy.   

Kieran Fitzpatrick is from County Donegal, the most northern county in the Republic of Ireland and the county with the longest border with Northern Ireland.  Kieran’s major flaw is his obsessive devotion to both the cause of the Provisional Irish Republican Army and his friend Ian Murphy.

County Donegal has the reputation for being fiercely independent and boasts the greatest number of Gaelic speakers of any county in the Republic of Ireland.  Kieran is one of the founding members of the Provisional Irish Republican Army (PIRA) and a member of their ruling Council.

Kieran recruits Ian to join the PIRA following the death of Ian’s best friend, Timolty Doyle, during a raid in Belfast.  Kieran convinces Ian to use his skills as a writer to write propaganda for the Cause.  In 1977 Kieran recognizes that the PIRA recruits are not disciplined and are disorganized.  Kieran convinces Ian to write a training manual for PIRA volunteers.  Ian writes the manual that became known as the Green Book.  The tide turns for the PIRA with disciplined volunteers and the friendship between Ian and Kieran is impregnable.

Kieran’s devotion to The Troubles and Ian clash in the last chapter of Murphy’s Troubles and he’s forced to make a choice between his devotion to the PIRA and his devotion to his friend, Ian Murphy.  Kieran has the choice to betray the Cause or to betray friendship.  Whatever decision Kieran makes he will pay a personal price.

Caitlin is Ian Murphy’s younger sister.  Ian is ten years old when she is born and at that age has no interest in having a sibling – especially a girl.  Caitlin looks up to her older brother but finds him aloof and a bit of a mystery.  By the time Caitlin is eight her brother is off to Dublin to attend Trinity College.

The relationship with Ian begins when Caitlin is 18 and engaged to be married.  Caitlin wants Ian to be a brother to her finance, Brian Lourigan, because she believes Ian has always wanted a brother rather than a sister.  One of Caitlin’s flaws is that she is always trying to fix things that don’t need fixing.

Ian completely rejects Caitlin’s idea that Brian Lourigan can be his brother.  The two men, on the surface, have nothing in common.  When they meet Brian is 20 years old and a mason by trade.  Ian is 28 years old, a graduate of Trinity College, an author and lecturer at University College Cork.  However, the two men are unaware they have two things in common.  First, they both have secrets and second their secret is that they are volunteers in the Provisional Irish Republican Army.

Caitlin’s major flaw is that she is an idealist.  After Brian Lourigan is killed in a botched IRA bombing she moves to Belfast with their one year old daughter (named Brianna for her father) to work with Sinn Fein to bring peace to Northern Ireland.  Her move causes major heartache for her mother.  Her father refuses to visit her in Belfast because as a young man was a volunteer with the IRA and believes violence is the only way to reunite Ireland.  Caitlin’s idealism is the cause of her own family dysfunction.

Brianna is injured by a Molotov cocktail while playing in a Peace Zone in Belfast causing Caitlin’s idealism to be shattered forever.

      

As with any relationship my relationship with my former publisher, Mischievous Muse Press was a learning experience for me.  Soon after the contract was signed suggestions for improving my manuscript were made.  One of the owners edited the first three chapters and instructed me to use her edits as a guide to re-writing the novel.  I followed her suggestions; however, my learning style requires constant exchange and a lot of questions. 

My re-write based on the suggestions of the first three chapters was only moderately successful and represented some growth and improvement in writing but I admit, not a great deal.  After reading the first re-write another owner suggested I purchase and study the book Word Painting – A Guide to Writing More Descriptively by Rebecca McClanahan. The instructions I was given for the next re-write was:  Show me Ireland!  I purchased the book and decided to read it carefully before embarking on the second re-write.  The chapters include:  What is Description?; The Eye of the Beholder; From Eye to Word; The Nose and Mouth and Hand and Ear of the Beholder; Figuratively Speaking; Bringing Characters to Life Through Description; The Eye of the Teller: How Point of View Affects Description;  Descriptions of Setting;  How Description Shapes the Narrative Line and finally The Big Picture. 

I took weeks studying McClanahan’s book.  My habit is to extensively underline both to help me to remember and to look up and find key passages months later.

McClanahan’s book has had a profound influence on my writing.  I must admit when I worked on the second re-write I realized my plot took place in a vacuum.  I hadn’t described characters by their appearance or mannerisms or what they ate and drank.  I had also omitted all but the most scarce detail on physical setting. It was a different manuscript when I was finished. 

All of the reviews I’ve received and comments from readers and book clubs extol the sense of actually being in Ireland when they read Murphy’s Troubles.  I’ve been complimented for capturing what it’s like to be in Ireland both from the characters and the landscape.

  

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.   

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.

          

I took a month off from fiction writing after completing the first draft of my second novel.  I’ve vacillated on a title but recently have settled on Out of Darkness, at least for the time being.

While I took a month off from fiction writing I didn’t stop working as a writer, I continued my blog, my Extra Innings column and most important, researched self-editing a novel.  Of course, I would never take on editing by myself.  I will hire the same copyeditor and proofreader, Christine Keleny, who worked with me on Murphy’s Troubles.  I am also working with my dear friend and mentor, Marshall Cook on story development and novel structure.

About a week ago I sent Marshall the first three chapters to read.  As usual, he gave me thorough, thoughtful comments – three pages worth of detailed review.  The last line of his review said it all.  “After studying these comments I think it would be a good idea to re-write the first chapter.  I hope you agree.”

I felt like a train that just derailed.  I didn’t need to tinker with this or that I need a complete re-write.  I studied his comments and read my manuscript together so that I could learn from his analysis.  Of course, Marshall is right, the chapter needed to be re-written.  I spent three days re-writing that one chapter and have sent it to Marshall for critique.

This experience has taught me that I misjudged the time I’ll need to edit a 97,000 word novel.  The first chapter is absolutely critical and I may need to change the point of view, meaning a complete overhaul.  I am thankful that I have someone like Marshall to help me learn the craft.  I need to get on the right track.