Kathleen L. Martens – författare

First Place Winner of Best Novel in the Delaware Press Association Professional Communications Contest 2022! Kate Ketchum is inflicted with the disease of desire. Impassioned with fantasies of a singing career and traveling the world, she abandons her generations-old family tradition working at the declining Owl & Shamrock shoe factory. Leaving the stage of the local pub she's graced for years, Kate pursues her music education, when a surprising college scholarship to the University of Connecticut provides her escape route. Enter Michael James. Back from two tours in Vietnam with haunts and secrets he's loath to share, he rejects his father's Harvard legacy and family business, and heads to UConn.  Wanderlust captures the college campus life where Kate and Michael's worlds collide in 1968 against the backdrop of the Vietnam war—passionate times of change, hippies, and history. Disappointments, distractions, and devastation, U-turns, misfortunes, and the fast lane lure each of the characters to unexpected destinations—from an institution for disabled youth to a concert in Paris to the bustling streets of Bangkok. Will their differing passions and history heal them or tear them apart?

Second Place Winner of Best Short Story Collection by a Single Author in the Delaware Press Association Professional Communications Contest 2022! Against the backdrops of thundering waterfalls, raging rivers, reflecting ponds, and the ever-alluring ocean, Kathleen Martens' award-winning short stories take the reader on tough and tender journeys across cultures and continents. Spanning the 1800's to modern times, from the Delaware beaches and British high society to the wilds of Canada, the streets of Washington, DC, and beyond, Rising Women, Rising Tides: Stories of Women, Water, and Wisdom delivers its high-impact tales of life, liberation, and love with rich and varied voices. From a marine biologist to a Guatemalan eye surgeon; twin-sister folk singers to a blind veteran; cancer survivor to Nanticoke native; Deaf teacher, and homeless woman, to opioid addicts, and more, the collection offers a memorable spectrum of women protagonists rising.

Third Place Winner for Best Novel in the Delaware Press Association Professional Communications Contest 2023! Raised in a cloistered convent, world-renowned American investigative reporter Vanessa Gold uncovers crimes and builds cross-cultural bridges. While exposing the flaws of others, she conceals dark secrets and lies about her own past. In 1990, an American company constructs a gold mine on a remote Indonesian jungle island. Previously untouched by modern society, an isolated tribe is living a Stone Age existence. When indigenous tribal woman, Lukeem, reports her first sighting of the miners' mysterious helicopter to her tribe, she is accused of being a sorceress. By tradition, she is to be sacrificed to the river spirit. Tribal tradition links the timing of her sacrifice to the next full moon. Vanessa intercedes in the intercultural drama along with her life partner, cameraman Tony, best friend and anthropologist Canyon, and Turning Prism, their Oscar-winning documentary team. The unexpected unveiling of her estranged mother's identity and the appearance of a nemesis from Vanessa's past, threaten to destroy her life's work, her relationship with Tony, and the reputations of Canyon and her colleagues.  Fascinating cultural norms are explored as Lukeem, her son, and Vanessa escape together through the jungle seeking Lukeem's salvation. Can Vanessa bridge the vast cultural gap between the Paleolithic past and the 20th-century present? Can she prevent the devastating and consequential exposé of her own life?