C. K. Kelly Martin

It’s the kind of dreary rainy day where everything looks gray, and feels cold and slow. The kind of day where you don’t have much energy, but force yourself to march along regardless. According to the local forecast we’ll have four days in a row like this before we break free of the pattern on Monday. With little temptation to go outside by all rights this should be a great day for writing—and I’m trying, but like everything else today, my writing is gray and slow.

So I’ve designated the next little while as break time, or update time. Not long ago I blogged about releasing paperback copies of Yesterday and its sequel Tomorrow together as one book. Those copies are currently available at Amazon.com and other various Amazon outlets, as well as Barnes and Noble. I also hope to have the duology ready for ebook formats in a couple of weeks. In the meantime there's a Goodreads giveaway for Yesterday & Tomorrow under way.

Goodreads Book Giveaway

Yesterday & Tomorrow

by C.K. Kelly Martin

Giveaway ends October 14, 2016.
See the giveaway details at Goodreads.

Enter Giveaway

Draw date is October 14th and the contest is open to residents of Canada and the United States. I have my own copy for safe keeping and I have to say it looks pretty spiffy. Weighing in at 516 pages and 170,000 words it's a whole lot of book!

But Yesterday and Tomorrow aren't my only books to get new looks. A couple of weeks ago I also redesigned the cover for Come See About Me and am quite pleased with the new approach. The ebook versions share the same new cover design, and if you order a paperback, the front and back cover will appear like this:

If today was as pleasant a day in Oakville as we see pictured on this cover, I probably wouldn't be typing this update now!

Being back in Ireland I always feel as though I'm visiting my previous self. Of course, in some ways our past selves are always with us. I'm still a twelve year old with braces, a film student in love with screwball comedies, a newly married twenty-eight-year-old, and a thirty-seven-year-old who landed her first book deal.

–

–particularly Dublin - I always feel as though I'm visiting my previous self. It's an interesting feeling. Every version of ourselves is still with us, every day, in some way, of course. I'm still a twelve-year-old with braces, a film student in love with screwball comedies, a newly married person of twenty-eight, and the thirty-seven-year-old who landed her first book deal.

But in Dublin it's different. I almost feel as if I could catch sight of my former self ambling past on Dame Street wearing Levis and Doc Martens, and with a lion's mane of wavy hair. As though the touch of my soles on Dublin city streets year after year has solidified various ghost versions of myself. It beams the visions back to me as I round the corner onto Grafton Street, stand on the cobblestones in the Trinity College grounds, or when the light catches my eyes at certain magic angles while waiting to flag down a bus.

When people talk about love at first sight usually they mean with a person, but I had that with Dublin. Even when it drove me crazy in the worst ways, I never stopped loving it too.

I first landed in Dublin in 1990. Then I came back and came back and came back and stayed for years. Left for Canada but came back to Dublin to visit. Came back, came back, came back.

Every time it knows me. It never forgets. We have some special thing going, Dublin and me. I've written about it on the blog before and I've written about it in the book closest to my heart. I hope someday you'll get to read it. In the meantime, here are some of the things I saw while in Ireland this August.

Moody sky on Dame Street, Dublin

Dun Laoghaire pier, Saturday evening, County Dublin

Dun Laoghaire pier, County Dublin

GPO, O'Connell Street, Dublin

Grafton Street, Dublin

Kilkenny Castle grounds, August 24

Me in the middle of charming pedestrian Kieran Street, Kilkenny

Picturesque downtown Kilkenny

Lovely Kilkenny, by the river

Homemade soup from the tea room in Kilkenny castle

If you go to Kilkenny castle don't miss the tea room - the dessert counter is pure amazing.

Love that someone gave Thin Lizzy's Phil Lynott a rose! Harry Street, Dublin

Muckross House, Killarney National park

In front of the Hobbit-themed pub, downtown Killarney, bundled up for the rain

Stunning Killarney National park in the rain and mist

Downtown Killarney

Pint of Killarney in Killarney

This was the scene in Henry Street, Dublin last week. So sad to see all of the Republic of Ireland's HMV stores closing. Closest one you can find is now in Belfast, the sole HMV left on the island.

Inch Beach, Kerry. Wild weather day. Could hardly turn to face the water because of the sand gusting into your mouth. Stunning beach. Saw it once back in 98 in the sun and was in awe. But this wasn't the right day for it. Having said that, was impressed with the kite surfers out there, flipping into the air and flying.

Torc waterfall, Killarney National park

Tipperary Bridge

Happy to get some of our dirty clothes out of our suitcases and onto the line at my mother-in-law's house

The place I seriously started writing - my in-law's roomy back garden shed where we lived for several months before leaving for Canada. The location also figures largely in my YA currently out on submission.

Stray cat living in my mother in law's backyard we were all feeding. It boldly tried to get into the house one day and after being chased out, went back to calmly basking in the Irish sun.