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- May the Road Rise Up to Meet You
Hello again!
I hope you’re having a great week so far!
Y’all, St. Patrick’s Day is this Sunday, and I could go nuts with all the Irish feel-good news I could put in this newsletter, but I will try to restrain myself, if only for your sake. 😂 I’ll keep this newsletter to its usual length instead of being 100 pages long, but it will have a St. Pat’s theme to it—hey, we are all Irish this weekend, after all!
May the road rise up to meet you,
Yasmine McAli 💚
What I’m Feeling Good About
St. Patrick’s Day, of course!! 😉
And, in honor of St. Patrick’s Day, here is a tiny excerpt—a sneak peek, if you will—from my upcoming novel, The View from the Cliffs.
This is from a scene (in the middle of the book) that takes place on the southwest coast of Ireland:
They came into County Kerry at sunset, with the MacGillycuddy’s Reeks casting their purple mountainous shadows upon the horizon. Ranya felt as though her eyes would never get enough of the lush, green carpets of grass that surrounded them and went on for as far as sight could see, folding themselves under the mountains in the distance. Gabriel, who was driving, announced with a flourish, “We are now entering the Kingdom of Kerry.”
“The Kingdom of Kerry?” Ranya and Rasheed repeated in unison.
“There’s the Kingdom of God, and the Kingdom of Kerry, and, as the saying around here goes, ‘One is not of this world and the other is out of this world,’” Gabriel explained.
Ranya discovered the truth of this statement where most truths were to be found, and that was off the beaten path. …
She stood beside Gabriel as he pointed across the Atlantic waves that glimmered magnificently in the sunlight before sending their salt spray up from the craggy coastline.
“Those are the Skelligs,” he said of the two rocky islands that thrust forth their peaks from the ocean and toward the aquamarine sky. “The smaller one is known as Sceilig Bheag, or Little Skellig, while the larger is Sceilig Mhichíl, Skellig Michael—and it’s home to a remarkably well-preserved early Christian monastic site.”
Something about the two majestic rock formations, their haunting peaks jutting out of the Atlantic Ocean in defiance of the explosive, white-capped waves that sought to consume them, their jagged grayness a study in isolation and a statement of endurance through the relentless eons of sun, wind, and rain, captivated Ranya and begged her not to turn her back on them. She was loathe to move on and follow the others back up the path, feeling as though leaving this place would result in an undefinable yet monumental loss, a surrendering of this irreplaceable scene to the banality of the everyday.
Her heart ached at the thought of ever having to turn away. How could one return to life as it was after seeing this? She knew then that she would hold this place in her mind forever; on the worst of days, in the worst of times, this was where she would return.
The Skelligs. Photo taken by my husband on one of our trips to Ireland.
 View from the Skellig Ring, when I visited in 2017 |  Walking down Glen Pier Rd. to catch a view of the Skelligs |
 View from the top of Glen Pier Rd. |  House on Glen Pier Rd. |
To learn more about the Skelligs, see below. (And if Skellig Michael looks familiar when you see the pictures on the site, that may be because it was filmed as Luke Skywalker’s hideout in the most recent round of Star Wars movies!)
And this is a picture of me, taken in Co. Kerry, with the MacGillycuddy’s Reeks in the background:
A breezy day in County Kerry, Ireland, Sept. 2015.
What You’re Feeling Good About
Thank you to everyone who wrote in after last week’s newsletter! I really enjoy hearing from you!
As you saw in the last Positive Vibes newsletter, March is National Reading Month, and Mary Margaret (you’ll remember her from a couple of issues ago, with her Borkie Poo, Maggie Mai) sent in some reading recommendations. She is a fan of J.A. Jance’s mystery novels:
And Patti, who rescued that gorgeous Maine Coon cat, Millie, shared that she is sometimes known as the “Buttercup Bandit,” because she “rescues” daffodils from vacant lots and plants them in her garden:
(This section is where I’ll be featuring good news from readers—so please reply to this email and share some with me! It can be anything, big or small. Whatever you’re feeling good about.)
Irish Vibes
I’m delighted to be able to share this with you—it’s my Irish friend Maura Tynan’s brown soda bread recipe, and it is delicious. Read my post to learn more about Maura and how to make this simple recipe:
Interesting background on the life of St. Patrick himself:
And who doesn’t love Irish step dancing?
More Good News
The first American woman to race solo around the world—in a 40-foot boat!
Pawsitive Vibes
There are many Irish dog breeds; two of them, the Irish Setter and the Glen of Imaal Terrier, make cameo appearances in my upcoming novel, The View from the Cliffs:
Got a pet pic you’d like to share? Please feel free to reply to this email!
Riddle Me This
What would St. Patrick be called if he was born on December 25?
Answer below, at the end of this newsletter.
For Your Playlist
Did you know that it was Johnny Cash who wrote the song “Forty Shades of Green”? I didn’t find this out until I visited Ireland for the first time, in 2015! It was our marvelous Irish tour guide—now our good friend, Tom Tynan (Maura’s husband), who informed us of this.
Here’s the link if you’re on Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/track/6PzWWhmSOkgnra0bdp5lzx?si=9019cc299c7c43f5
Last Word
An áit a bhfuil do chroí is ann a thabharfas do chosa thú.
(“Your feet will bring you to where your heart is.”)
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Answer to the riddle: St. O’Claus.