Niamh, this is something I figured out in grad school when one of my profs tried to get me to quit a class that I thought I was failing: If the failures and the quitters were playing baseball, the failures would win every time because the quitters wouldn't even show up.

Try the shop. Research the market, talk to a financial advisor and try the shop. Sure, it might fail. Own that going in and you'll do fine. I did.

Worst case scenario, you go into bankruptcy, which is not what it was years and years ago. Seven years and it's like it never happened and you've got some interesting stories about that time you ran your own shop.

Regarding the stories... I've been mulling UT over in my mind. What does it not have that OGAM does? A dynamic between the two protagonists that starts from day one. People will enjoy sliding around in your elegant prose, but that's what's going to keep them coming back, chapter after chapter. Get the goddess and the lit teacher started right away, before you even tell us that they're a goddess and a lit teacher.

Write for yourself first. If you manage to sell it, rock on, but count it like a windfall, like winning the lottery only more likely and with an intellectual contribution to homo sapiens.