December Member News

Lots of possibilities to add to our last-minute Christmas shopping list! Congratulations!

NEW RELEASES

Susan Wittig Albert  A Wilder Rose

Brilliance Audio will bring out the audiobook edition of this historical novel, to be published at the same time (March 17, 2015) as the Lake Union reprint edition. The book tells the true story of the mother-daughter collaboration (Laura Ingalls Wilder and Rose Wilder Lane) that produced the Little House books.

Janet Jensen’s new release Gabriel's Daughters (Jolly Fish Press) has also won a silver award in religious fiction from Readers Favorites. The novel wrestles with issues of polygamy, homosexuality, and modernity through the lives of the large, loving, and polygamous Martin family. The story is told primarily through the eyes of Zina Martin, a young girl who, upon discovering she is impregnated by her "sterile" teacher—and will soon be married off to a man three times her age—escapes the enclosed polygamous town of Gabriel's Landing, Utah. Zina then embarks on a journey full of self-discovery, yet she can never completely escape the longing she has for her family and even the controversial and outdated lifestyle she once lived.

Leslee Breene “The Christmas Gift”, an Ebook short story for the holidays. In 1883, Miriam Cole travels to Denver at Christmas to deliver her orphaned baby nephew to her married sister. The sweetness of his touch upon her cheek makes her heart tighten. When the time comes, how will she ever let him go? “With both verve and delicacy, Ms. Breene reminds us that miracles are indeed possible.” ~ Jane Choate RWA author of Keeping Watch – Harlequin

Diane Gardner, OregonState Penitentiary (Arcadia Publishing)  As the only maximum-security prison in the state, the Oregon State Penitentiary (OSP) has housed some of the most violent criminals on the West Coast, including brutal serial killers Charley Panzram in 1915 and Jerry Brudos in 1969. Sixty men have been executed inside OSP. The prison was originally built in Portland in 1851 but moved to Salem 15 years later, after Oregon became a state. From that time forward, the Oregon State Penitentiary grew from 23 prisoners in 1866 to 1,912 by 1992. 

B J Scott The Rail Queen, fifth novel in his Tales of Strong Women series. This novel, set in 1884, tells the story of Montana schoolgirl Ryka Sundstrom's unquenchable dream to build her own railroad. Her struggle is interwoven with the blossoming of the American railroad as it knits together the east and west coasts in a brief glorious period when all things were possible, even for a teenager with an outlandish dream and the will to pursue it. bjscotthistoricals.wordpress.com, amazon.com createspace.com/5028104

Penny Sidoli The Intersection of Daydream and Driving Slow is a collection of short stories by, with the setting of the contemporary American West. The book is available on Amazon.com as either paperback or ebook.   “A collection of wildly original tales packed with descriptions of the broad landscape of the American West, and lively characters who jump off the page into your heart.” 

Patricia Grady Cox Chasm Creek A hangman's noose stands between Morgan Braddock and the family he loves. Esther Corbin clings to a marriage with a man who has abandoned her and their four children. Ruben Santiago scorns his native heritage after being kidnapped from the Navajos and raised in Mexico as a Roman Catholic. Three unlikely friends. Three lives based on lies. Until ghostly visitations and violent confrontations shatter their illusions, and each must find their place in the merciless Arizona Territory. Chasm Creek incorporates aspects of the Navajo Long Walk into a story of love, loss, and fates entwined.

AWARDS

Deanna Dickinson McCall Mustang Spring Stories and Poems  won Poetry Book of the Year at the annual Western Music Convention and Awards in Albuquerque NM. Mustang Springs is a book about the real people of the West. Their stories are told in poetry and prose that will make you laugh and cry. She also won the Georgie Sicking Award for an individual poem, “Cow Country Code.

Anne Schroeder's break-out novel, Cholama Moon, has been named favorite non-traditional Western novel in True West's List of Favorites for 2015. Cholama Moon is a gritty historical romance set in California's Central Coast.

Karen Casey-Fitzjerrel, ForgivingEffie Beck is a finalist for the 2014 EPIC Award for Historical fiction. In this Will Rogers Gold Medallion Award-winning work of fiction. Mike LeMay, a Federal Writers’ Project interviewer arrives in a small Texas town days before the town eccentric, Effie Beck, is reported missing. While conducting his interviews, Mike learns that the enigmatic, elderly Miss Effie has moved through the lives of the town’s populace "like brown smoke" after having suffered a harsh childhood under the discipline of a cruel father.