She doesn't bring it. She hasn't got it. Sonia O'Sullivan is wearing silver around her neck but the Olympic medal is nowhere in sight. No, she can't show it, not tonight, says the slim and smiling star who arrives to launch Running to Stand Still, a photographic documentary of her life over the past year.
The gazelle-like athlete is still glowing after her surprise run and victory in the Dublin City Marathon. She's wearing a silver-blue, chenille top over a long, slate-grey skirt. Elegant and calm, she signs autographs and answers questions patiently and graciously.
"It's a fantastic memory of the year. I'll treasure it forever," she says of the book. "I just think it's a great story." The good wishes and fan mail are still arriving, she says. She's received "squillions" to date. It's all sent in packs to Cobh and then forwarded to her address in Australia by her family. Her father, John O'Sullivan, has come up from Cork for the launch at Jury's Hotel's penthouse Martello Room. Her two Dublin-based uncles, Glen O'Sullivan and Martin O'Sullivan, are also here, along with her partner, Nic Bideau, and 15-month-old daughter Ciara.
Patrick Bolger, the man who has followed her around with his camera since last January, is here to introduce us to everybody and tell us how the book happened. Was she an easy subject to photograph? "She was an honest subject," says Bolger, from Valleymount, Co Wicklow. His two sisters, Sharon Shadlow and Linda Curran, stand by listening proudly. "Often there was very little conversation. She went ahead with her work and I went ahead with mine ."
The words in the book are written by Tom Humphries, Irish Times journalist, who says: "She gave answers that were more honest than could be expected." The writer has just arrived back from Reykjvick, still breathless from the late-evening rush. He's here with his partner, Mary Hennessy. His mother and father, Mary and John Humphries, are here all the while, keeping an eye on the couple's two girls, Molly (8) and Caitlin (7).
Meanwhile, later in the week, a photographic record of a different sort is launched by Brendan Kennelly at Hodges Figgis book shop. Island Funeral by Bill Doyle, with text by Muiris Mac Conghail, records the funeral of Joe Mhairtin O Flaithearta, of Baile an Chaisleain, in 1965 on Inis Oirr, the smallest of the Aran Islands. It is published by Veritas.