Review for A Place of Safety-Derry

 Wow...just...wow...

BookLife:

Raw, pulsing with life and danger, and building to a hard-to-shake climax, this epic novel of growing up in a world gone mad centers on Brendan Kinsella, “a lad filled with hopes and dreams and prayers and promises” in Derry in Northern Ireland, in the tumultuous 1960s, when “Catholics were killed for being Catholic and Catholic schools were attacked by Protestant fools, all because the Catholic minority in the state had the nerve to want the same rights as any Protestant.” Those killed include Brendan’s father. The city seethes and divides as he enters adolescence, confused and fascinated by sex, roiled with complex feelings about his abusive “da”’s death, and all-too-familiar with phrases like “papist scum.” Brandon’s life is shaped by hatreds, bombings, checkpoints, and fleeting moments of connection and beauty in the rubble.

The likelihood of violence haunts both Brendan’s youth and Sullivan’s clipped, brisk, hard-edge prose. A civil rights march facing a line of constables “kept flowing, like a flooded river smashing against a jam of logs and refuse”; Brendan, the famous “fix-it lad” of his circle, laments “the vicious politeness I was being handed by people I’d been doing work for since I could first hold a set of grips.” Dialogue, too, is sharp, slicing, and convincing. The novel is long, but Sullivan, a prolific author in a host of genres, wastes few words conjuring the milieu, the prevailing sense of desperation, and the ugly but undeniable thrill of striking back.

Tense marches and confrontations at checkpoints abound, including one beauty in which women harangue soldiers abusing Brendan and co. with the finest Irish profanity. Sullivan is just as committed to capturing Brandon’s development in moments of relief, working at an auto shop and enjoying the occasional escape, with friends or eventually a lover, into what he calls a “new and amazing world of peace and tolerance.” Those reprieves make the finale all the more wrenching.

Takeaway: Wrenching epic of coming-of-age in Derry during the Troubles.

Comparable Titles: David Keenan’s For the Good Times, Anna Burns’s Milkman.

Production grades
Cover: A-
Design and typography: A
Illustrations: N/A
Editing: A-
Marketing copy: A

Do I love my words? Or my characters?

I wrote a 14 page synopsis for New World For Old, laying out the main beats in each chapter and the flow of the story as I'd written it, so far. I took that with me to San Antonio and worked on it. Red pen everywhere. Notes out the wazoo, if I'm able to read my scurvy handwriting...and I feel a bit overwhelmed by the journey ahead.

I probably added the equivalent of five chapters and 20,000 words to the story...all to help build Brendan's journey into a quiet shore of gentle waves, but with riptide sneaking beneath the surface. I know that's a bit grandiose, but I feel entitled to it, right now. There is not one page of that long-form synopsis that is without commentary, and all the blank backs of the pages have directions on where to rearrange things or entire moments to add in.

Meaning I'm doing a page-one rewrite of this volume, right down to finding some better chapter headings.

I think the most important thing these notes did was to remind me that Brendan handles trouble by fixing things. Joanna even mentions it in Derry. It's how he maintains a form of control in his life. That's partly why, when chaos hit him at the end of Volume One, and there was nothing he could do...nothing he was allowed to do to make it better...he broke free of the real world to give himself time to fix himself.

I'd sort of lost track of that in NWFO, to an extent, but found a way back to it and will work that in, more. He already fixes his Montessa motorbike so it's better than new...but then he finds an even bigger project to help him deal with his mother's illness and conflicting emotions about it. He thinks she hates him and he's both sorry she's ill but also relieved and feels guilty over that relief.

It doesn't help that he's not Brendan Kinsella in Houston; he's Brennan McGabbhin. So his repairs are also a way for him to keep in contact with who he really is and not lose himself in an identity his uncle is forcing him to maintain.

I dunno if that makes sense, but I'm embarking on at least another 7 rewrites of this book. My hope is it will by the end of the last one.

I have no control over my mind

Nasty trip home. Hellacious and exhausting. Yesterday was dead space in brain. Today was searching for something to break the clouds in my brain. So I wrote this. May make it a book. Or a novella to go with another one I posted some time ago. Dunno. I'm just in a foul mood and angry.

FREDDY

Young Freddy had gone for a walk.

His mood was...he’d rather not talk.

A neighbor he’d just met, named Ray,

Still stopped him, to quietly say,

“Some friends of mine, Chuck, Dan and Bill,

Think you’d be such fun...which you will.”

That’s when they appeared, as Ray’s pack,

To grab Freddy, in an attack.

He knew them all, knew they had wives

And kids...but they also had knives.

Both bound and gagged, he bravely fought,

But still got dragged off to a plot

With an old shed. Clothes cut away.

Forced down to a basement, to stay.

"We loved to see your tatts and ass

And wanted you, each time you’d pass,"

Ray said, as he forced his way in

Freddy’s mouth, the first to begin.

"The way you fit your jeans was tight.

So we're gonna keep you all night.

And when we're done then you will know

We own you and won't let you go."

This all was confusing. The lad

Did not know what he’d done so bad

To cause them to do this. "You're gay,"

Don said, going next. "It’s your way."

"Then so are you," Freddy spat back.

Which only led Chuck to attack

Him with fists. "You don't call us queer."

Then Bill snarled, "Let me make it clear.

It’s fags who get fucked, and not us,

So there's nothing more to discuss.

We'll keep you to use, till we're done.

Then we’ll go find some other one

Just like you, who we'll pass around.

While you'll be six feet in the ground."

Oh, shit. Other men disappeared

With no word. All dead, as was feared.

No, that won’t be me, Freddy thought.

No man gets to think that he’s brought

Me here to be killed, like I’m trash.

I’ll live to make sure your lives crash.

Two weeks he spent playing their toy,

And he made sure to bring them joy

By using each trick he had learned

To make every time with him earned,

As he built a plan to regroup.

Until the night he got the scoop

That by morning, he’d leave this earth

In spirit. But he had no dearth

Of ways to escape far from them

And not accept their evil whim.

So that's what he did. And he kept

How he did it a secret, but wept

In the court as he told the foul tale.

And those four men went straight to jail.

Then Freddy said, "I'll write a book,

And in it you can have a look

At the evil those bastards did me.

Now I’m a gay hero...and free."

So far so good...

Christmas visit was nice, despite two VERY long drives, both with me behind the wheel because my youngest brother never learned to drive. That runs in the family; our mother and grandmother never did, either. Just busses and cabs.

Considering how people have forgotten driver etiquette, it might not be a bad idea for me to do, as well.b I did a lot of yelling, down here.

I got some things I asked for, and wound up giving everyone gift cards since I had no idea what they wanted. The vast majority of us are on the same page, politically, so no arguments done. So damn much food -- turkey, ham, stuffing, gravy, corn on the cob, whipped potatoes (my way of making them, with an egg and some cheese), green bean casserole, salad, roasted yams, croissants, rolls, gravy, and cheesecake.

I'm glad I got an even more space seat on the JetBlue flight home; I'll need the extra room.

I'm not going to finish reading Trust, just now. I'm focusing on going through my notes for APoS-New World For Old and for Blood Angel-Franz. I also want to get involved with a new group what will be helping get books too erotic for Kindle and such published.  See if I can get HTRASG set up in it.

Still no word on the review promised me for APoS-Derry. I'm hoping it comes in this week.

I almost think I've recharged my batteries and can get more done in the writing, faster. The ideas I have for NWFO should fit in easily, and some will change the events of APoS-Home Not Home.

I'm actually looking forward to getting back on them.

Photos of my trip...

 These are photos of my trip to San Antonio, to visit my sister, brother and nephews.

My brother and sister sitting along the Riverwalk in San Antonio, talking.

Riverboat dining. Once the food is brought out, the boat begins its tour along the river.

The former Nix Hospital, where my grandmother was a nurse in the newborn nursery on the 23rd floor. She worked there 30 years.

The Alamo, of course. The plaza is torn up in some ridiculous attempt to make it into a touristy theme park. But at least the painting of John Wayne in his movie The Alamo is gone from the gift shop.

Casa Rio, the first restaurant on the Riverwalk. Serves so-so Mexican food but it's been there for nearly 70 years and started the riverboat dining. Behind it is the Hilton Palacio del Rio, which was built using pre-fabricated rooms that were then stacked onto each other, in 1967, for Hemisfair.

Lunch at Schilo's German Deli. They make their own sauerkraut and root beer. Best ever.

Also had dinner with one nephew at a Rudy's, which offers a great brisket and excellent BBQ sauce, and we talked for hours. Tomorrow is the drive down to Aransas Pass and Christmas.

Southwest Airlines sucks...

Headed for San Antonio, I changed planes in Baltimore. My app told me I was going out of gate B9. It was actually B5. The plane was fully boarded on time and ready to leave...but we sat there for a solid hour. We were still waiting for a bag from another flight.

For some reason I think they were bullshitting us.

So I got in an hour late, then Avis tried to give me a Toyota Tacoma 4x4. I drive a Civic. The smallest car they had available was a Malibu, so I took that but it's like piloting a barge. The hotel is okay, but I stupidly decided to travel up to Austin, today, to check out a store called Glass Coffin...and traffic was hideous thanks to construction, wrecks, and the usual Texas idiots on the road who won't go the speed limit and are in the far inside lane. What used to be a 1-hour trip took 2.5.

It's a fun shop, and I did find a book to help me with Blood Angel -- A History of the Vampire in Popular Culture by Violet Fenn. I think I'll read this en route home. On the trip down, I was reading Trust by Hernan Diaz, which won the Pulitzer for Literature, last year...and I am massively underwhelmed. I'm being told the story instead of experiencing it or getting lost in it, and it's becoming a bit of a chore to finish. I'm about halfway through.

I've already engorged myself with Taco Cabana and Whataburger...and found there are Panda Express and In-n-Outs all over the place. But tomorrow is Rudy's BBQ and Schilo's German Delicatessen, then Saturday is driving down to Aransas Pass for the family Christmas.

Brendan has a moment in New World For Old where he feels like he's broken free from his family's demands and limitations but winds up being called back in, and I can see that in me, right now. I love them all...and love living at the other end of the country from them so we don't have to interact every day. I'm sure they'd wind up hating me after a little while, I'm such a self-involved freak.

Which makes it hard to shop for them at Christmas.

The beginning of my APoS aspic...

Meaning, it's beginning to gel in my head. I'm getting ideas and nudges from Brendan about what to put in not only New World For Old but also Home Not Home.

For example, he wants more time with what is, basically, a second family he builds when he sneaks away from his aunt and uncle's home after a brutal interaction over him dating a Cajun girl. His plan is to get away from them, but he has no idea where else to go so finds a furnished room over near the University of Houston to give him time to think...and grows close to the people who live there.

The place is owned by Mrs. Glendon, who's elderly, always wears light caftans, on the ethereal side, and has a sort of whatever happens happens attitude. The other boarders are:

1. Elton, who's tall, thin, quiet, very shy and still, on disability. his eyes see all, and he's a savant in languages. He becomes pen pals with Rhuari over Gaelic, once Brendan connects them.

2. Richard Markowitz, who's Jewish, stocky, hairy, has a Roman nose, and is always in a suit. He works in food management. He's waiting to see if a contract at UH will become permanent. It doesn't, so he moves on to NASA in Huntsville, AL 

3. Myron Phelan, a young man with cerebral palsy who's independent to a fault, as Mrs. Glendon says. He has sharp eyes and a hawk-like nose. Everyone thinks he's on disability but when he dies they learn his parents put him there because they didn't want him at home. He has a twin brother who is okay but is never seen. 

4. Mrs. Kendall, who's black, very large and a chatterbox. She lives on SSI and cooks killer meals from ingredients others bring her, twice a week, for everyone so she can keep the leftovers.  

5. Miss Alexander is thin and always well dressed, with hair in a French twist. She works in the fabric shop of a local department store and keeps to herself. 

6. Sonja is the granddaughter to Mrs. Glendon, who's chunky, avaricious and surly...except when playing piano. She lives in an apartment over the garage, out back.

He also connects with a guy named Randy-Ray, 50s, who runs a motorcycle shop off 45 and Stoke, back of his house. Brendan gets parts for his Montessa motorbike there and winds up repairing a wreck of a green Peugeot 504, left drive, in exchange for parts. He rebuilds it as a way to repair himself.

I'm not sure how much of this will work in, but I know I'm adding at least one more chapter to give Bren time with them all, then they're part of his Houston life from then on.

I don't feel like writing, no sir...

No writing today. Instead, I watched this little video and let the whole world pass me by as I just vegged and let what Ik'm thinking about APoS-New World For Old settle into my brain.

The anatomy of music is fascinating.. 

On 47 more drafts to go...

Done with this read of APoS-New World For Old. Its up over 131,000 words. And there's more bluntness and anger involved but it's circling in on what it needs to be. And I did it despite a nasty stomach ache. I don't know what I ate, since all I had for dinner was frozen fish sticks, well-cooked, but it's not being happy.

At least I'm through another stage of the story. And scared to death it's going to ge severely criticized. More panicky than anything. But I'm not stopping. I have enough certainty in what I'm writing that I think it will come through well-enough. I'm mainly worried about the details and picky people. There are a lot of assholes out there who will seize on an inperfection to destroy your work. I've seen so much of it happening, lately.

Of course, with the Smashwords sale on for ebooks, I've sold a lot of them...and won't get a single review out of any of it. I have very few reviews...so maybe that's a form of safety against the real world.

Fuck this, I'm getting some Alka-seltzer.

Consistently inconsistent...

Being my usual self, I pulled up BA-Franz to work on...and promptly shifted to read more of APoS-New World For Old. Got through the point where Brendan is, effectively running away from home for the second time. This happens after he's kidnapped from outside The Colonel's bar, where he used to work, and brutalized by some racists over having a girlfriend who's not white. He figures out his uncle knew what was going to happen and said nothing because he thinks Brendan needs to be taught a lesson about how he needs to behave, in Houston.

I'd made changes to the story in the 4th draft that I didn't remember, and which fit in better with what happens in Derry. Mirroring, not repeating. And having a read-through done before heading to San Antonio would be very helpful. Bring the story back to mind so my brain can begin working on it.

You see, I'd pulled up and printed the character outline of BA and started making notes for Franz, but realized I needed to work it out better so the story has some continuity. I'm starting with Léonidès stating he's been refused permission to turn Franz into another Blood Angel because the Oiym are not comfortable with him. They sense his beauty hides a viciousness they don't want out and about in the world. It will draw too much attention to the existence of vampires.

But as noted, when Leon tries to kill Franz, he hesitates and the man shifts into becoming a Blood Angel, and the Oiym's fears are proven to be well-founded. I know the final showdown between the two is going to be in the Vatican, which was not yet a city-state in the middle of Rome. Not sure what that's going to wind up as, but it'll be fun.

After all, the Catholic Church is really nothing more than an acceptable version of a vampire organization. Isn't it?

Conundrum...

Can someone explain something to me? My perfect man is Chris Evans. Tall. Darker hair. Face in excellent proportion. Built nicely. Hair on chest. Talented actor. Has a strut that screams erotic. And laughs in a way that makes me grin like an idiot. Even when he's a bad boy, he's sex on a stick.

I've been watching him develop since he was in this silly little movie called Cellular, which really made no sense but was mindless fun.And he just kept getting better and better looking. Even in Knives Out in that bulky Guernsey sweater, he was hot.

So...why am I also obsessed with Nick Hendrix? He's not unattractive, just nice-looking. Trim but not especially built. Looks good in a suit. Not all that much hair on his body. Pleasant face with what I call poached-egg eyes. And an okay actor who does the job.

But two new episodes are out of Midsomer Murders, where he plays DS Jamie Winter and is second fiddle to Neil Dudgeon as DCI Barnaby. He's not given a lot to do, and only occasionally works the part into something more, but I got excited and watched both episodes, tonight. And he still is not that impressive, physically, but my focus was on him.

A few years back, I used him as the image for Finn, a British cop in my book The Beast in the Nothing Room. Not Henry Cavill (who is phenomenally good-looking). Not Greg Wise (who was gorgeous in Sense and Sensibility). Not even Russell Tovey (whose off-beat looks and aura would have been lovely).

No, it was the image of Finn (looking and behaving like Nick) being kidnapped, raped and brutalized, over and over and over in the book, that worked for me. That inspired me. I think it's one of the best books I've written. Not because of the sex but because it's inventive and scary and 95% just right. The last chapter of the book, how I finalized Finn's life, was too simplistic and could have been handled a lot better...but everything else came together beautifully, thanks to him.

So I don't get it. I don't think he's gay or in the closet. And he's English so it's doubtful he's circumcised. Truth is, I don't want to take him to bed, not really. But even with him in his late 30s and starting to show it, I enjoyed watching him.

Now I'm working on my vampire piece and it's drifting into pure horror, and while the models I'm using for Leonides and Franz are beautiful, their victims will be more normal. I'm also emphasizing the cruelty of their deaths, even if they are deserving of it. And the terror the victims feel. Especially at the hands of Franz, once he's turned. Still, if I could work Nick into it, I would...only I've already used him and don't like to use the same model twice.

Makes no sense to me.

Blood Angel-Franz...

It's decided. I'm working up book three of Blood Angel, and it's called Franz. Léonidès wants to turn Franz into a Blood Angel like himself, to be his mate, but the Oiym, who control the vampire world, refuse to let him. They are wary of giving Franz that kind of power and actually order him to be destroyed.

Léon reluctantly agrees, seduce-rapes him and starts to feed on him...then hesitates, which gives Franz just enough time to begin to turn. And that is a huge mistake. Now he cannot be killed.

Franz is beautiful, but he's also demonic. He held his true nature in check thanks to his breeding and military training. But now that he's a Blood Angel, all sense of morality and manners is gone, gone, gone, and he becomes a cold, cruel, calculating beast. More on the level of Léon's sister, Gabrielle, and exactly what the Oiym feared he would be.

They had set up a number of rules as safety measures in the vampire world, in order keep the human world from really noticing them. His casual disregard for those rules threatens to wreck everything. It's up to Léon to find a way to control him before the Oiym come after him to imprison him in Alexandria.

Only the man is infuriated with Léon over having forced himself on him. So he taunts Léon by terrorizing and killing men who resemble him, and he flouts the Oiym's rules, as if daring them to stop him. What can Léon do? If Franz goes to jail, so does Léon since he started the problem.

This part of the story is going to be very dark. I know my version of darkness is far lighter than many other writers, but we'll see what happens. I've already got a confrontation between Léon and Franz at the end that I am going to make myself let be as horrific as possible. Franz might not be able to die, nor can Léon or his pack, but anyone else around them can.

Äingeru Vilabrillë...

I cannot think.

I cannot be

Caught in the insanity

Of hate and pain surrounding me.

I dream of peace I'll never see.

I need a spirit animal to guide me through this vile new world of social media. This lad, Äingeru, a breeder of Arabian horses in Spain, would more than do. Doesn't hurt he has an OnlyFans page as a way to make money to help provide for for his beautiful beasts. He'd come with no surprises, pun not intended...not really...

Because it wouldn't be a sexual thing, in all honesty. I have an aversion to uncircumcised dicks thanks to...well, to history. But he comes across as nicely growly. Protective of anyone he joins with, like a wolf. And just having someone like him to lean on...to stand between me and the world...it would be so nice, for a change.

Because everywhere I look, people boil with anger and disdain for others. I'm close to shutting down my Twitter, Instagram and Tribel because it's reached the point of full-blown madness and sends me careening towards despair at some of the amazingly stupid shit I've seen on them.

Lies. Misdirection. Racism. Anti-semitism. Cowardice. Criminal nonsense going unpunished. The usual It's all your fault and never mine kind of childishness. I've begun blocking people, something I swore I'd never do. But you have to in order to maintain some semblance of sanity.

It's at the point I'd be happy for Mother Nature to wipe us out and start over, with Cephalopods. They're actually more intelligent than 99% of the world's population...and I think I'm being kind in that assessment.

I'm finally understanding why hermits hermit.

Scrambled brains...

Can't focus, right now. I've got half a dozen stories slamming at me now that I'm done working on APoS-Derry. There's APoS-New World For Old, in Houston. Dair's Window, which I haven't touched in nearly 3 years. Part 3 of Blood Angel...then part 4, which is partially written. And APoS-Home Not Home is kicking at me with suggestions and notes and comments. And now a prose poem telling the story of a man who's kidnapped and held captive by a group of married men to be sexually abused, in secret...I posted the initial part I'd written on here weeks ago.

I'm feeling the urge to write something dark and brutal. Something in keeping with my other work. A need for it building up like a swollen river caught at a logjam, growing and pushing until it crashes through and causes untold destruction.

Part of the reason might be from my watching some of Peacock's John Wayne Gacy: Devil in Disguise. It focused a lot on Gacy's last victim, a 15-year-old boy named Rob Piest...a nice-looking kid who was just looking for a decent-paying job.

I have long had a room deep inside me that holds a near fanatical fascination with gay serial killers like Gacy, Dean Corll, William Bonin and Randy Kraft, amongst others. Men who kidnap, rape and murder young men and boys. I don't understand why they do it...and can't decide if I really want to know. I think something similar to their psychoses is hidden in that room and I don't want to confront it except through my writing.

I've been raped. I know what it means. How destructive it is. And yet...there's a part of me that finds the idea of forcing a man to be with me tantalizing. Sensuous, almost. I've had the opportunity to do that, a couple of times. Many years ago. And managed to keep my head and not take that step. But knowing it's there spooks me.

I mentioned that I could easily become a serial killer, to a co-worker, once. She said it wasn't possible; that I had too much empathy. I like to think that's why I never did anything to do that to someone. That using my books as an outlet was sufficient. But you never know, do you?

You never really know...

Strunk & White proves AI is of the devil...

To any and all, SpellCheck and Grammerly cannot be trusted to provide you with the correct usage of words. I found that out as I did one last check for grammar on APoS-Derry, using the option offered by the newest version of Microsoft Word. Here's some of what I got.

In the blue box is what I wrote. Below is what they think is correct. I'm too knowledgable of English grammar to fall for it, but a lot of people may think this damned program knows what it's talking about. Don't trust it. Get and read a copy of Strunk & White's Elements of Style for something simple and basic. Available in any bookstore or online.

Grammar Nazi, out.

 

Inputted...

All the corrections I made when doing my backwards proofing on APoS-Derry are completely input. Now I just need to make certain I have consistency on a couple of things -- like the spelling of O'Faelan, the last name of Brendan's best friend, Colm. I noticed I spelled it O'Fealan twice, which is easy to miss so double-checking. And I'm using Word's editor to check on my use of grammar.

I'm not adjusting my style to suit a basic grammatical method. Brendan writes and talks in his own fashion, and it ain't necessarily Strunk & White. What's fun is, I noticed on two occasions Word's editor wanted me to change too to to, which would have been the wrong version of it. Not cool, spellcheck.

That's why I stopped being a Grammar Nazi online; I realized Spellcheck was putting out the wrong info 25% of the time.

I'm neurotic enough to know what the proper uses are for your and you're, as well as their, they're and there. But if English is your second language or if your schooling has been second-rate when it comes to English, I can see where the damn program making the wrong suggestion would be difficult to ignore.

Just what you need in today's world -- a helpful program that will fuck with your mind.

Structurally sound

Digging through APoS-New World For Old is showing me that I'm skating through the story, so the next drafts are for deepening the characters and their meaning in events. What I have right now is just the foundation of the story, with points noted here and there to remind me of what needs to be looked into.

I've read through to the point where Brendan meets Evangelyne and is about to embark on a relationship that has disastrous results. I've also come up with another possible explanation for Brendan's disappearance from Derry -- that he was arrested and is being held by the British in a secret place. Which sounds ridiculous, but it mitigates the prevalent rumor that he was executed by the IRA and buried in an unmarked grave, and conspiracies are often preferred to the truth.

Part of the reason for that shift is how Eamonn, having been arrested for munitions running, is becoming a good communicator for PIRA in the H-Block prison cells. People thinking they had his brother killed for messing up an operation, the indication being he was passing information to the British through Joanna, that would hurt Eamonn's reputation. So up comes this new suggestion and a flat out denial from PIRA that they killed Brendan.

I don't know if that will really work within the story, yet, but it's another step closer to solidifying the fact that his new life is not connected to his old one except through his aunt and uncle, and they are hard as nails about not releasing information about it.

Did a lot of this in the airport while waiting for my plane. I'd thought about going to the Academy Museum of Motion Pictures, but found I was trying to talk myself into it. Like it would make some kind of difference in my life. Reality is, it would remind me of how I failed in that endeavor, so focused on reading through APoS-2. And I'm happier for it. This is my direction in life, now, not movies.

Old man complaints...

I am so fucking tired, and it's not just physical weariness. Tuesday and yesterday were spent going over printed matter...hundreds and hundreds of pieces, and the monotony of the job got to me. As did having to stand throughout because it was that or keep getting up and down as I sorted through the morass.

Turned out only half of the stacks of items I was going through were on the list, even though all were supposed to be. But I had to check every single one of them, and even wound up finding some that had no identifying notes but were on the list and working out what their inventory number was. Then today was getting it picked up and driving out to Sierra Madre to collect 11 cartons for another shipment, on my own.

It's not a lot of physical labor, and the drive out and then down to LAX were me in a car with AC and my phone tuned to KCRW's Eclectic 24. But I'm still exhausted, thanks to LA traffic demanding full and complete attention. Then tomorrow is packing everything into containers to ship out. I took a half hour nap at my hotel and I'm still not exactly 100%.

I can't keep doing this. I'm too old and out of shape. And I also have other priorities, now. I need the money, but if it means working myself into a grave before I'm done with APoS and other works, that's not an option.

I've read through the point where Brendan helps a woman escape her abusive husband, but he finds her then kills her and himself. Which sends Bren spiraling into despair. It still all seems a bit perfunctory, but I'm not really doing a rewrite, yet, so I'll worry about that when I dig in for good. I like the line of the story's events; I just don't like how they aren't really organic, yet.

One interesting aspect of this area is how Brendan is revealing a violent streak, that can appear when provoked. And more than a hint of cruelty. But also tenderness and understanding. Pretty intense for a lad who's seventeen going into eighteen.

I love LA but not the Valley...

I only have to drive 3.7 miles to where I'm packing up this collection, but the San Fernando Valley drivers are so insane it takes me 25 minutes to get there. Hi, I'm getting ahead of you and if you don't let me I'll hit the side of your car. And the everlovin', HONK! You waited till your car did a restart to start moving? WTF for? Or...You have 2/3 of a car length in front of you; MOVE UP!

My LA attitude is more attuned to the Basin, where it's fast and furious and pay fucking attention, even in standstill traffic on La Cienega. I can handle aggression on the road; what drives me nuts is the Do what I fucking want you to do, even though I haven't told you what it is because I'm too busy being an asshole and not paying attention to you even though I want you to pay attention to me kind of shit.

There's also a lot of how can I not help you at grocery stores and restaurants, but that's not surprising, after Covid. People don't give a shit, anymore, and I can't blame them. Corporations are buying everything up and doubling prices but cutting back on wages. Small wonder so many are pushing to start up unions. It's the only way to make the bastards listen and reconsider not fucking you over, not completely.

SAG/AFTRA passed its new deal with the studios. Now comes the fun of watching executives find new and more creative ways of fucking people out of the money they should be paid. Seems like nearly everyone in the upper echelon of executives are taking their cues from that orange bastard and just blowing off contracts, when they feel like it.

I'm close to hating capitalism and the greed of too goddamn many people.

Rant over. Now I can keep reading through APoS-New World For Old...and think of how much crazier I can make it. Ah, Houston in the 70s...

Getting busy...

Today was checking books off against the list I had, and it was not easy. But I got it down to where only 5 books could not be found on the list and a half-dozen were listed but not in the stacks. I've let the powers that be know and they will have final word. Tomorrow comes printed matter that will be a bit easier, since it's numbered. For the most part.

I've found the WiFi in my hotel is too prone to letting others link to my laptop so I'm using my phone's hotspot. It's good, here. It's nearly non-existent at the job, but if I work it right I can do it there, too.

The photo is the view from my downstairs window. Not bad. Be better if i could see the ocean.

Got through more of APoS-New World For Old and hit a spot where Brendan starts to wonder about the arbitrariness of the world. He almost joined Elmer Wayne Henley and David Brooks in going to Dean Corll's party, but because he had a fan he wants to repair in hand (one he'd found in a trash can) he doesn't go. And two weeks later it comes out that those three were raping and killing boys.

It gets Brendan to thinking about this insane need for control so many people have. He's wondering if it's a way to stave off accepting that shit just happens in life, without rhyme or reason. If you can control someone else, that means you can control your circumstances and the world is no longer arbitrary...or something like that. It's a bit juvenile of a concept, but Bren is just 17. He thinks older, in many ways, but is naive in others.

I just don't want his slowly emerging awareness of life and its cruelty and beauty to be dismissed as childish prattle.

Catching up...

I've begun re-reading what I did with APoS-New World For Old, to re-familiarize myself with it and note where I need to make corrections to tie it in properly with Derry. Nothing serious, yet. The first chapters deal with Brendan coming out of his shock at seeing the bomb go off and people killed...including Joanna. I've already been told by one editor that ending traumatized her.

I'm not completely happy with the explanation of how Brendan was brought into the US, but I'll deal with then when I start a real re-write. This will actually be #5, if I go by how my files are numbered. Only 477 more drafts to go.

I'm currently in LA and had a decent flight that was actually on time. I'm still recovering from that infection that still causes a tickle in my throat that makes me hack like a 40-year smoker. But I can feel it's getting better in little bitty steps.

Tomorrow is the first job up in the Hollywood Hills. I took a drive up, just to see what it looked like...and it's one of those scary roads that has room for one car at a time. And I've got a Ford Bronco that's like a barge. And I don't know what it is about Fords, but I have a hell of a time seeing over the hood. It's like the damn thing is bulging up in front of me. It was the same way in that Mustang. Makes me very uncomfortable.

Especially when the damn road is so twisty-turny.

Corrected...

There's a certain numbness that comes to me when I've finished a full scale edit like this. And I mean one this precise. I didn't just correct typos and misspellings and set the proper tenses of words throughout the story, but also cut and reworked sentences and moments to be clearer. Page by page, going backwards to keep myself from getting caught up in the reading of it.

That's not easy to do. Most of the pages started with half of a sentence in half of a paragraph. Then you jump to the page immediately prior and it's a completely different sentence and thought and time in the story. It's a bit jolting. But that's what I needed. Next comes inputting the changes into the text of the hardcover copy of the story.

I know I still missed some. I went back into chapter 4 to check on something and found, without even trying to, a sentence beginning with a lower-case letter instead of upper-case. And that led me to run through the entire alphabet, using the "find" tool looking for any others. I'd input ". a" and see what it came up with, which was usually nothing. I did find one instance where I'd put a space after an ellipses, which I don't do, so corrected that, too. But nothing else popped up.

Of course, that still led me to rethinking a word I was using for a couple of women gossiping in their kitchen. The word for that in Derry is craic -- so changed that...which led to me splitting another sentence in two, since it made better sense that way.

Swear to God, I could work on this another 10 years and find issues that need to be addressed or bits that needed to be adjusted for clarity. But I can't keep doing that. I promised Brendan his books will come out, next year, and so they shall. I think I once mentioned a schedule of January, July and December. I'm going to keep to that...

...if the fates will let me.

Meaning next is New World for Old in Houston. I have editors wanting to read it, already.

Oh, well...the text will be right in the book...

I heard from BookLife that they cannot update my submission for reviews, but swear that the typos won't matter in the review. We shall see. My one real consolation is, this book will be tight once it's in print. I may miss one or two, but I remember books coming out from major publishers that had notes added to them to state "this line on page 225 should read..."

Erratum was not unheard of, before. I think this is my favorite reference to it:

Of course, even the first time I saw this I knew Ben Hur wasn't published in 1860, but the duplicated line might be correct. Mistakes are not uncommon.

The Alice '65 is based on the first edition of Alice's Adventures in Wonderland being withdrawn because the illustrator hated how his work was printed in it. Which wasn't so much an error, really, but the artist just being difficult. Still...the fact that only 24 are known to exist makes it very valuable. Which fits.

Maybe that's what'll happen with APoS. Early versions have an unseen error and I find it and change it and the first ones become collectors items. Maybe.

It's good to have dreams.

Weary...

I'm not feeling good; some kind of upper-respiratory infection is going around and I got it. Not Covid; I've run 3 tests and all are negative. But I've coughed myself into a headache, and the only thing that seems to remove the ticking in my throat is drinking Dr Pepper, since it's carbonated and is like scratching that fucking itch. Gargling with Listerine diluted in half does help, but not all that much. However, doing that I don't need to pee every hour on the hour.

I managed to get through more of APoS-Derry's backward proofing, and it seems the closer I get to the beginning the fewer typos I find. Probably due to all the times I reworked the first chapters to work with the last. I have 9 left. I've been inputting any corrections I make on the ebook format of the novel, so it will be ready to upload to BookLife to replace the one that's currently there. 

That's such an embarrassment. I should have waited till I did this before sending it in for reviews.

This shows why I'm a bust when it comes to fixing and promoting my work. I should hire someone professional to do not only the proofing but also some editing. Someone to point out when I get repetitious or inconsistent in the story.

It's said that Hemingway didn't become a great writer until he worked with Maxwell Perkins. Same for Thomas Wolfe, who was known to love his own writing, unlike me. Perkins was an amazing editor who could catch the gist of the stories and would argue with his writers and fight to help them make their work even better. Hemingway, Fitzgerald and Wolfe...all their greatest books had his fingerprints all over them.

I need a Maxwell Perkins.

Jobs, jobs, jobs...

I'm off to LA on Saturday and another job came through today, out there. So I'm jammed with work, Monday-Friday, with my flight returning to Buffalo on Friday night. One is on Mulholland and damn near impossible to get to, easily; one is in Sierra Madre, which is really more of a pickup and single pack; one is just making sure boxes go into bins properly for transport.

Wonderful. I would be recuperating for the rest of the month except I'm flying to San Antonio on the 20th and dealing with family till the 26th. Glorious. I'll need till March to get back in gear.

I learned, today, that Direct2Digital POD will be just as obnoxious about erotica as Ingram. They definitely refused to set How to Rape a Straight Guy up for print and distribution and sent me this explanation in response to my query. None of which is in their Terms of Service. Fucking asswipes.

I mean, WTF does mainstream erotica mean? Danielle Steele romances with a couple of bad words in them and intimations of sex?

I can still get HTRASG printed up for me, if I want. And I can sell it, myself. But I'm not set up for that. It's irritating, but there it is. I guess I can think about it...but not right now. I need to finish APoS-Derry.

Most of the day was working up my new schedule, ordering materials and making sure I had everything I needed as well as contacting the clients to verify next week's business. I still got through more of my backwards proofing of APoS...and found two more typos. Again, easy ones to miss. One word was in singular when it should have been plural, and the other was the wrong tense.

I also found I'd inadvertently identified a tea shop with the same wording, as if it was a new place for Brendan and Joanna, twice. They were separated by a chapter so again, easy not to notice. Cut the second one that's in the story.

Dear God, I'm suck a fuck up when it comes to typos and mistakes.

Backwards is good

I'm going backwards through APoS-Derry, one page at a time, of course, and have found three more typos. This time it's two words jammed together without a space between them, two words conjugated without an apostrophe, and a missing period. All very easy to overlook. At least it's getting better.

The problem with doing this is I've decided to cut a bit more. In and of itself, that's not a big deal since I've yet to set it up for print. But I have submitted it for reviews and now may need to update the file I sent in. Don't want reviewers whining about typos and the book seeming unedited.

I know I should have done this before I did that. Such is life. One of these years I'll learn how to do things right the first time. Or not.

Got an email from D2D POD saying they didn't want to offer HTRASG in their catalogue. I've asked them why, since it doesn't violate any of their stated limitations and am waiting on an answer. I pointed out Amazon still offered aftermarket copies of the book, so it's not banned by them. They have that as a deal-breaker; if Amazon says no, it's no way in hell.

I'm just so fucking tired of this puritanical bullshit happening all over the US. I don't like what you write so I won't let anyone read it. Fascist fucks. I get that D2D is a private company and it can decide for itself what it will and will not offer in its catalogue, but you should be up front that your so-called erotica section is very limited in what is and is not acceptable.

I went through a lot of trouble to set the book up in their system, and would much rather not have done so if they're going to be dicks about it. And you can rest assured, I will make damn sure, if they still say no everyone in the writers groups I belong to on Facebook will know about it.

Dunno if that'll work to change their minds, but I got Amazon to back down the first time they banned HTRASG. Maybe again?

Got a cold...

I think. I took, a covid test and it came up negative. Taken another one and waiting for it to finish. My feeling is, I stirred up some dust and it's messing with my sinuses and given me a touch of bronchitis. But we'll see.

Today, I set How to Rape a Straight Guy up with D2D POD. Seems if you use a PDF for the text instead of Word, it maintains its formatting. I'm waiting for the proof...and word as to whether or not they will offer it; they might not...then I'm ordering a physical copy to see, before I allow it to be offered. It's going to be limited in who will carry it due to the sexual content. If I had Curt just killing people, that'd be fine. Any library or book store would be happy to offer it. But two men having sex? No can do.

Doesn't matter that it's rape, in the book. Books with women being raped and with incest are available on library shelves and carried in B&N and the like. It's insulting, but it's how we are, today. I ran into that when Amazon did its first ban of the book, back in 2010. They carried the Flowers in the Attic series, which has incest and a baby born from it, and Wild Orchid and such, but those were offered by major publishers who could fight back.

I think they were surprised at how hard I fought them on HTRASG. And that I refused to give up. They finally agreed to offer it in paperback but not Kindle, mainly because they were too lazy to do an adults only section, back then.

I also worked up an ad for Rape in Holding Cell 6. I've rather neglected pushing that book. That's inappropriate. It's got a wide-ranging story and is the prelude to The Vanishing of Owen Taylor, so needs to be done up right.

Another negative reading. One might be false but not two. Cool.

Full dust jacket...

I worked on this, today. Getting it as close to done as I can. I'm leaving space for  reviews that might come in by the end of the year. Of course, if they're really bad I may make something up. We'll see how it goes.

I like the general look of the dust jacket. Normally, publishers full-justify the synopsis on the flaps but I think the left-justify fits better with the book, overall. What I'm showing here is the third version. The first two were okay enough but this one is it, I think.

The good thing is, I won't need to finalize it till the end of December, so I might still make changes.

Now I can get started on my backwards proofing of APoS. After realizing my version of Word might be part of the reason for so many typos, I especially need to verify everything is in order. Again, I have time...though not all that much. Next Saturday is leaving for a week-long set of jobs in LA and then I'm going to Texas for Christmas. Oh...my...

I'd rather stay home.

I almost got a job in London from someone I've done work for on a few occasions, but it got to be sounding sketchy. Hand carry a small work of art to a university. That can be really tricky since universities usually have their own brokers to handle imports. Plus, duty is due on art, not to mention Customs fees...and I got the feeling it was being sent undervalued, which is a very big deal if Customs catches you.

So backed away. Dammit.

What did I do today?

I honestly have no idea, except I dismantled by Mac Mini, answered emails, and watched an old episode of Midsomer Murders that I didn't really like. And by old, it was 2nd or 3rd season and written by someone out to get even for slights in boarding school. I cleared my recycling. Watered my plants. Made blueberry muffins with pecans. And the rest is just blank...like I went into auto-pilot.

Oh, I did get my LCCN from the Library of Congress, for APoS-Derry. That means when I do publish a hardcover copy of the book I have to send them a copy and it will be part of the LoC's collection. I'm quite pleased about that.

Thanksgiving is early, this year, so I keep thinking we're into December when we still have a week. And then I remember I'm leaving for LA a week from tomorrow...and may be there longer than I thought because another job popped up that I will need to deal with. Nothing major, just make sure bankers boxes are packed into a D Container for shipment across the country.

I've got several things I want to get done before Christmas, but cannot make myself face them, just yet. So I'm coasting along.

Aw, fuck it. I'll get everything done when it's done. I worry about self-imposed deadlines too much. The only thing I really have to do by a certain time is a sketch of our grandmother's house in San Antonio, for my sister in Aransas Pass.

We lived there a lot of our lives, off and on. Nana bought it in 1941, once she began work at the Nix hospital in the newborn nursery. She had to do it through a savings and loan because she was a divorced woman and no regular bank would deal with her, back then.

There was no fence, she had a mimosa tree in the yard by the driveway and an oleander bush under her front window. It was a cranky place on cedar stumps for a foundation that had to be reset every 5 years, and was painted white with dark gray shingles. She sold it when she realized her cancer was inoperable and incurable, and passed away not three months later.

But that's what sister-san wants for Christmas. Shit...I don't even have Christmas cards, yet...

Damn...

I did the last of a read through of CK and found a couple more spots where letters had been dropped from the text, but were correct in the printed book. And...one where a word was singular that should have been plural, which was in the printed copy. So now it's done and in a PDF and I'm beat so checking it over, tomorrow. This time just making sure the page numbers are in order. It's a holiday weekend. Nothing's getting done till Monday, anyway.

I got so engrossed in getting it done, I almost missed Thanksgiving dinner. I'd planned to make a green bean casserole and cornbread to go with the turkey slab and mashed potatoes I had, but wound up hungry so just heated everything up and made a quickie salad from a beefsteak tomato and cucumber. And had a beer. Gravy on the turkey and mashed potatoes was courtesy of a can of Campbell's mushroom soup, and it was craisins for the cranberries.

I made myself eat it at my table instead of my desk. It was nice. So easy and quiet. And I do like Shiner Bock. Now I'm having tea and contemplating what's needed for tomorrow. It's time to remove my Mac Mini from my desk, for example. I can do Photoshop on this laptop so that little beast is just taking up space.

Hope everyone's Thanksgiving was nice and non-confrontational. I just had to repost this...

WTF????

I don't know what happened, but when I adjusted Carli's Kills into a PDF to upload to Ingram Spark, it wrecked my Table of Contents. Those numbers are not correct.

I didn't notice until I got the proof back. Now I'm going through the whole book to make sure everything is all right. Truly freaked me out, but I looked at copies of the book I'd had printed, before, and it was fine in them...so this is just some issue with the document.

This is me and electronics. I came so close to just automatically approving the proof because I've never had a problem with it, before, but noticed the numbering almost by chance and now I'm paranoid like you would not believe.

The next time I shift this Word text into a PDF, I'm doing it through the printer to see if that is better. I may even do it on the company PC, to see if that kind of computer works.

There was a car wreck at the Rainbow Bridge going into Canada and the right wing was screaming it was terrorism...only it's just a wreck. A middle-aged man in a $300,000 Bentley had a medical incident or did some drugs and lost control and is now dead. And places like Fox News and the right wing scum who love to blame everything in the world on Democrats almost seem disappointed it was not terrorism. And not one apology for their fake hysteria.

God, sometimes I'm ashamed to be part of the human race.

Down day...

And by down I mean emotionally. Had to handle a couple of things for the upcoming jobs in Los Angeles then had a followup eye appointment to check on this floater I have in my right eye. Seems to have stabilized, but my ophthalmologist says it's permanent and probable I'll wind up with a similar one in my left eye; that's how these things usually go.

That knocked me off center. I don't want to have to worry about going blind. That would destroy me. I'm set to go back in six months instead of a year, to keep watch on it.

It was raining steady and cold, and my neck was starting to act up. I have psoriatic arthritis in the left side of it and it hates the cold. But I found if I keep it wrapped up it's not as bad. I'd had a light lunch so was hungry and wanted a burger, but the only place around was a Mickey D's. Which was fine; I did a quarter-pounder with cheese meal.

Still, it didn't stop me from following a path of whining about where I am in life. I wanted to go straight home and just lie in bed, but I'm out of groceries -- milk, veggies, jam, DPZ, pretty close to bare except for some dry and canned goods and a couple frozen meals. So had to go Tops, and my car needed gas. Didn't get home till five.

While getting out of the car, I shifted my neck in some way that shot a vicious pain down the left side of my back. I was halfway afraid my muscles or tendons or something were going to seize up, so I did not move until it all stopped. I'm still a bit sore...

And now I'm an old man talking about his aches and pains. What a cliché.

Regarding APoS, all I did was update the synopsis and cover with Book Life. I also set up Carli's Kills with Ingram, again. I had to re-send them the files for the text and cover, but there's no cost for it. I'm going to push the book as best I can, to get its paperback sales going. They weren't at all what I'd expected with Kindle Direct. The e-book is still with Smashwords.

I'll have to build a better market for it. Most of my work is gay-oriented while CK is very straight, if rather kinky. First chapter has a naked woman who's just had sex being pushed off a 25th floor balcony to her death, by Carli...with her contemplating having fun with the naked, married male lover. Still, my audience prefers the wicked pleasure of reading about men being raped by men; a woman doing it doesn't have the same pull.

Dunno why; women can be just as cruel as men.

Front flap of dust jacket

I've adjusted the cover, a little, and this is what I've worked up for the synopsis on the dust jacket:

A Place of Safety is the story of Brendan Kinsella, a simple lad in Northern Ireland who just wants to live his life...but history keeps interfering.

Derry

Northern Ireland, 1966

Partitioned from the main part of Ireland since 1921 and dominated by the Protestant majority, the Catholic minority has grown weary of the discrimination against it so has begun to push for equal rights. One-man-one-vote. Decent housing. Good jobs. The most basic of requests. Yet these are still too much for those in power to accept. So there are confrontations and demonstrations that, step-by-step, grow more and more dangerous and violent.

Caught in the middle of this is a Catholic boy named Brendan Kinsella. Just days after his tenth birthday, his father is brutally murdered. But because the man was a vicious drunk who kept the family in extreme poverty, Brendan is not sorry he is dead. However, he was killed by two Protestants, which makes him into a martyr for Ireland and sets his mother, Bernadette, on a path to Irish Nationalism. She drags his older brother, Eamonn, along with her, but Brendan is resistant.

The third of her six children, Bernadette constantly belittles him as simple-minded, despite his knack for repairing things. In truth, he is quietly observant with an innate skepticism, and prefers to go his own way and form his own opinions, even though that sometimes leads him into trouble.

Through the next six years, Brendan is caught up in the growing turmoil, including several Civil Rights demonstrations in Derry; the attack on peaceful marchers at Burntollet Bridge; the Battle of Bogside, the following August, where Catholics forced the Protestant police force out of their neighborhood; the arrival of British troops to separate the two warring sides; internment without trial and...Bloody Sunday, the massacre of Catholics by British forces.

Mingled into this is Brendan's budding relationship with Joanna, a Protestant girl from a well-off family. A relationship that must be kept secret for fear of reprisals...from either side. But he doesn't care; she is pretty and fun to be around, has a life of relative ease and is certain she is bound for university. She helps him see there can be more to his world than hate and distrust, that his hopes and wishes and dreams can become reality...that they can find a place of safety, even as their world careens towards chaos.

Well, it's done...

I finished prepping APoS-Derry for ebook upload, next year...and submitted it to Publishers Weekly for a review. They say it could be months before I get one, if I do, but we'll see what happens. This is really becoming official. I even worked a little on the cover and think this will be it...except I need to do something about making Derry show up better.

I'm having to relearn Adobe Photoshop Ps because everything is more detailed, complex and hidden. And awkward to use, in some ways. I had to go online to find where the formatting guides were; I'd forgotten they were a folder in a folder in a different place on the screen.

I still need to make my mouse less sensitive. And trackpad. And figure out how to change the color of the pen tool. And I finally just looked up a worksheet for figuring out inches into pixels then used the cover template guide from Ingram to make sure everything was in the right place.

Good thing is, I've got plenty of time till actual publication to make it look good. Doing a hardback with a dust jacket is hard work, which is why I've only done it three times. Well, this will be number four.

Now comes the truly fun part of going through a printout of the book, page by page, backwards to finalize my hunt for the great mean typos. Soooooooooooooooooo looking forward to that.

Tolstoy, stand aside...

I've got 30 chapters to A Place of Safety-Derry, and I'm halfway thinking of breaking two longish sections in half to make it 32 chapters. By the time I get done with the whole book, it's gonna make War and Peace look like a novella. Just without the quality and craftsmanship of a great novelist.

Anyway, today was spent setting up bookmarks for the e-book version, verifying the chapter headings (since I changed a couple), and doing a bit more correcting. Found two more typos, of course, and did a bit of double-checking on a couple of things. Like when Brendan talks about repairing a Land Rover Defender and wants to know what model it is. He should be asking what series it is.

I also figured to add an indignant comment for Brendan to think when he learns Colm's father narc'd on him about taking Joanna home, one night. Charged both for going to her house and back to the bus depot, and still turned on him. His information verifies she's Protestant and her family is well-off, and puts both her and Brendan in danger from their respective sides in the conflict.

His buddy, Colm...his China, as they call each other...gives him a quiet warning that he's being watched and people are not happy. It's even suggested he might be passing information to her to give to the Protestant paramilitaries...which anyone who knows Brendan knows is nonsense, but still, paranoia rules.

I did a couple more bits like that through the story, and dropped some lines that weren't needed and...and...and damn, rewriting is like a sickness. Like an addiction. No matter how resolute you mean to be when going into it, the ideas come and take control and you drift into another realm of existence. And before you know it, you've done a full rewrite.

Just call me psycho, in the morning, angel.