Sonoma County Literary Update

Sonoma County Writers Published in 2022

Robin Gabbert—The Clandestine Life of Paintings in Poems

The Clandestine Life of Paintings in Poems is a collection of ekphrastic poetry or, more simply: poems inspired by art, music, films and dreams. Much of the inspirational artwork featured in the book with each poem, was done by Northern California artists as well as one landscape by Matisse and a portrait done by Modigliani. The author doesn’t “interpret” the paintings so much as reflect on them in different ways, using poetry to make the reader appreciate something new, and often unexpected, in the images.

McCaa Publishing, 74 pages. Available on Amazon.

Guy Biederman—Translated From the Original: One-Inch Punch Fiction

Influenced by Sonny Rollins and Thelonius Monk, powered by chi, inspired by Bruce Lee, Translated From the Original: One-Inch Punch Fiction weaves through lines of love, loss, pain, discovery, and redemption, with dollops of whimsy and notes of wonder. Biederman’s genre-bending collection of flash and micro fiction is a book you’ll want to share with friends, but may hesitate to lend. Better get two.

Nomadic Press ($21): https://www.nomadicpress.org/store/p/translatedfromtheoriginal

Mara Lynn Johnstone—A Swift Kick to the Thorax

When space poachers release Earth animals on an alien world, threatening a fragile new alliance, they anger the wrong people. A veterinarian, an accountant, and a furious sign-language-fluent gorilla are coming for them.

Robin enjoys being one of the only humans around: an exotic outsider, strange and tall, with no shell and only two arms. Consulting for locals who want to keep Earth pets is a fine job. But when a swarm of rabbits invade town and humanity is blamed, everything unravels.

If Robin wants to save the alliance between two planets — and keep from getting sent home in disgrace — she has to prove that a powerful crime ring is behind the crisis. Luckily for her, she makes friends who are eager to help: from planetside, from the nearby space station, and recently escaped from the poacher’s ship. Those poachers may be bug aliens with an excellent range of vision, but they won’t see this coming.

Available now: https://books2read.com/b/bOnEWJ

Mario Dell’Olio—Letters from Italy

Letters from Italy is a story of true love that spans an ocean. Against all odds, an orphaned girl and a young dreamer find solace in a romance sparked by a single photo and years of transatlantic letters. From a tiny Italian town in pre-WWII to New York City in her golden age, hopeful immigrants take a chance at living the American dream. Set on the Puglian coast, a world comes alive with images of a fishing village, families from different socio-economic classes, and a love born out of chance.

When they finally meet, Nicoletta and Orazio know they are destined to be together. Framed by the letters they wrote to each other, Letters from Italy takes us on a passage back through time with a romantic young couple whose devotion to one another prompted a bold journey in a foreign land.

“Letters from Italy is an astonishingly beautiful work of art. I encourage everyone to read it. Brimming with romance, comedy, drama, history, and family lines. It’s everything.” –Jeannie Gaffigan, Writer, Producer, New York Times bestselling author.

Available on Amazon and Barnes & Noble.

Chester Arnold and Bart Schneider—The Daily Feast

The Daily Feast is the fruit of a joyous collaboration between two old friends, painter Chester Arnold and poet Bart Schneider. In the midst of the pandemic, unable to eat at their usual lunch spot in Sonoma, they decided to make a book entirely based on food and drink. Arnold brings his wit and old master fidelity to droll paintings of TV dinners, oysters on the half shell, and pineapple upside cake. Schneider’s odes to garlic, gefilte fish, and Green Goddess Dressing are both personal and imaginative. The series of conversations across disciplines becomes a double memoir of eating.

The Daily Feast is available at Readers’ Books and the Sonoma Valley Museum in Sonoma, at Moe’s Books, the Berkeley Museum and Oakland Museum bookstores in the East Bay, and at Bird & Beckett in San Francisco.

Linda Bello-Ruiz—Betrayed

Engineer Javier Torres left the research center and drove his new truck down the private mountain road. He reached the main highway and headed to his girlfriend Carolina’s house in Toxatlan. Within minutes, sicarios—cartel hitmen—surrounded him with motorcycles and SUVs. As bullets from an assault weapon perforated the passenger door, Javier floored the accelerator, fleeing for his life. Where could he go? Who wanted him dead? Could this be an attempted takeover of his chemical lab? 

“Sicarios don’t miss” is a widely accepted refrain in Mexico, and it’s usually true. And yet twenty-seven bullets—ten in the truck’s headrest alone—told another story. Why had they let him live? 

The nightmare had begun. This work of fiction, based on actual events, will lead you on a nail-biting, heart-stopping journey with Javier and Carolina as they run for their lives, determined to find answers as colleagues and friends betray them.

Available on Amazon.

Joan Frank—Juniper Street

Reflecting on the charged, difficult passage from childhood and the arbitrary nature of personality, Juniper Street explores, in an interspersed series of snapshots, its narrator’s memory of her strange, formative adventures with her then-best friend, a spirited young artist who lives down the street. In autumnal tones, Juniper Street considers the movement of time, the selves we shed over years, and—like remembered music—a mysterious, burnished quality of inevitability about the past.

Winner of the C&R Press 2021 Fiction Award
C&R Press, $16, paperback. Ships October 15.
Pre-order at: www.crpress.org/shop/juniper-street

Joan Frank—Late Work: A Literary Autobiography of Love, Loss, and What I Was Reading

Curious, ruminative, and wry, this literary autobiography tours what Rachel Kushner called “the strange remove that is the life of the writer.” Frank’s essays cover a vast spectrum—from handling dismissive advice, facing the dilemma of thwarted ambition, and copying the generosity that inspires us, to the miraculous catharsis of letter-writing and some of the books that pull us through. Useful for writers at any stage of development, Late Work offers a seasoned artist’s thinking through the exploration of issues, paradoxes, and crises of faith. Like a lively conversation with a close, outspoken friend, each piece tells its experience from the trenches.

University of New Mexico Press, $19.95 paperback; $9.99 ebook. October 2022
Pre-order at: https://unmpress.com/books/late-work/9780826364203

Shawn Langwell—Ten Seconds of Boldness

Ten Seconds of Boldness outlines a simple yet transformational five-step method to move you from where you are to where you want to be in a way that is purposeful, meaningful, and lasting. Through personal experience and insights from influential leaders across the nation, Shawn Langwell will help you uncover the courage you need to live the life of your dreams.

Shawn says he wrote this book because he didn’t want to die with any regrets. Buckle up and enjoy the ride!

Published July 2022. $19.95. Available on Amazon, Smashwords and bookstores everywhere. 

Jon G. Jackson—Practicing Silence

Patrick Fanning—Three Layer Watercolor Landscapes: Try It Yourself

Patrick Fanning has been painting watercolors for over twenty years, ever since he retired from writing and publishing self-help psychology books. He was one of the founders of the Graton Gallery, has exhibited widely in Sonoma County, and has taught watercolor workshops in Northern California, Italy, and Costa Rica. He has been teaching a basic watercolor landscape class at OCA since 2019. Three Layer Watercolor Landscapes is the text he created for his OCA class. This book combines his love of painting with his old day job of teaching people how to master new skills. 
Available from Occidental Center for the Arts: www.occidentalcenterforthearts.org/upcoming-events/book-launch-three-layer-watercolor-landscapes-by-patrick-fanning

Phyllis Meshulam, editor—The Freedom of New Beginnings: Poems of Witness and Vision from Sonoma County

A broken world needs poetry. Phyllis Meshulam, poet laureate of Sonoma County, California, invited poets to map the three stages of reconnection as conceived by Buddhist scholar and Rilke translator Joanna Macy. This anthology is a journey of witness and renewal in uncertain times. The poems in the beginning section, “Gratitude,” celebrate people, survival, and the beauty and bounty of the natural world. Rerooted in belonging, with quiet hearts and minds, we are ready for the next phase, “Honoring Our Pain for the World.” Yes, life is suffering, but when we read poems about despair, oil spills, racism, violence, illness, and greed, our hearts break open with compassion. The third section, “Seeing with New Eyes,” explores the fresh perspective that accompanies the pain and joy of rebirth and the clarity of awakening to the world around us. As D. L. Emblen expresses it, “if one persists in not looking,” you can lose a mountain or “the face of one you say you love.”

The possibility of change is as close as our next breath. With resilience and calm attention, the reader of this book may discover what poet Katherine Hastings calls “the freedom new beginnings bring.”
Poetry Crossing Press: $20

Stephen Altschuler—Beating Insomnia: A No-Nonsense Way to Natural Sleep

Simply put, this book will help you fall asleep, stay asleep, or, if necessary, help you get back to sleep naturally, i.e. without the use of prescription or over the counter medications. It is based on the author’s experience overcoming insomnia after three years of suffering, which included the serious consideration of suicide. The author is a master’s level mental health counselor.

Sacajawea Press
ISBN: 978-0578299082
112 pages. Available on Amazon

Mara Lynn Johnstone—Spectacular Silver Earthling

Hubcap used to be a rescue bot, getting humans out of every boneheaded scrape imaginable. His new career as a TV star suits him much better: he can poke fun at the humans instead, while harvesting jetpods and tackling alien predators faster than any of them. It doesn’t hurt that he’s also immune to the mysterious “space frenzy” that keeps sending his coworkers into a froth. The robot worries for his human friends, though he would never admit it. Not when it’s much more fun to deploy weapons-grade sass.
Making sure the meatheads don’t kick the bucket while filming is hard enough, but when a rival show pops up aiming to steal their sponsor, the pressure is on. Hubcap has to film the most spectacular footage yet, while avoiding dangerous wildlife, plantlife, and emotions.

The frenzy is getting worse, and this planet might not be uninhabited after all. The entire galaxy is watching. Time is short. But if anyone is up to the task, it’s the robot with skills second to none, and an ego to match.

Release date: July 7
Pre-order here: https://books2read.com/b/bx1ABl

Hemu Aggarwal—The Forbidden Letters

Nearly 500 century-old letters were found in an attic. The book includes a selection of 216 of them. It tells the story of a young couple’s life, married when they were still teenagers, but who lived apart intermittently for eight years. The letters describe their love for each other, the agony of separation, taboos of the times, and the hardships endured by women in a joint-family system. Crossing cultural, country, gender, and age boundaries, you take on a tumultuous 100-year journey from India to America, shedding the shackles of a joint family and allowing the next generation the freedom to chart their destinies. A journey that starts in 1922 and finishes in 2022!

A true story. Nonfiction. 402 pages. 
ISBN: 9798807764560
Available in paperback and kindle on Amazon

Redwood Writers 2022 Poetry Anthology—Crossroads

Redwood Writers is proud to announce the publication of its 2022 poetry anthology, Crossroads. A huge round of applause to all the poets in this wonderful representation of our branch’s writing talent. Prepare to be inspired as you read the poems of our club’s accomplished poets. Kay Ryan, the former Poet Laureate of the United States, has said “If we are not compelled to submit in some way to a poem, it cannot change us.” In this volume you will find the heart and talent of the poets of Redwood Writers. The intention of this collection is to present the many crossroads in the possibilities of being a fully alive human. You can purchase Crossroads ($15) at any Redwood Writers general meeting, or find a link on the website: redwoodwriters.org. Also available on Amazon.

B.K. Sweeting—Pearlized

Filled with mystery, thrill, and unexpected twists and turns, Pearlized is a must-read masterpiece of fiction. The novel tells the story of Oisín Murphy. As a boy, he discovered a small lustrous pearl in a pool of crimson gore, next to the numeral twelve drawn in blood, on the frozen bay behind his home. Before he knew it, Oisín was drowning in the darkness below the icy surface. His harrowing experience would haunt him for years to come, because it is also the anniversary of his mother’s unsolved disappearance. Oisín has long-since believed that the Pearl Point Murderer had killed his mother. Although, both the authorities and his peers don’t acknowledge what he saw as a boy. Presently, in the middle of a world-wide pandemic, Oisín’s internal demons arise from an isolated routine. To make matters darker, the past comes knocking on the 13th of October as an ominous birthday note, summoning him to face that bone chilling day on the bay. A deadly adventure ensues, across east and west coastal waters, intertwining the ones closest to Oisín and bringing him to a climax that you won’t see coming.

Available at Copperfield’s Books in Santa Rosa or order online at www.amazon.com/Pearlized-B-K-Sweeting/dp/1098397800. More information at: www.Bksweeting.com

Crissi Langwell—For the Birds

Crissi Langwell has released her 9th novel, For the Birds. When her ex returns to town, Cricket concocts a fake relationship to pretend she’s over him — but now they must work together, and it’s getting harder to lie. This humorous second-chance romance features a small town girl, her Scottish ex, and an obnoxious and lovable macaw. Inspired by the song “Exile” by Taylor Swift and Bon Iver, For the Birds is now available to read on all platforms. Find out more at crissilangwell.com.

Stefan Kiesbye—But I Don’t Know You

After twenty-five years in the United States, an immigrant loses his home and all personal documents and keepsakes from his childhood to a wildfire. Shortly thereafter, his marriage breaks apart and leaves him without witness to the years spent in the New World. The novel follows Cal, the protagonist, on his travels across the country as he tries to reconnect with lost loves, discarded friends, and estranged mentors. It’s a meditation on belonging, identity, memory, and on the stories we tell ourselves and others about who we were and who we have become.

Published by Saddleroad Press, 2/22/22
https://saddleroadpress.com/but-i-don-t-know-you.html

Nancy Cavers Dougherty—Heaven is in Truckee

Heaven is in Truckee, a poetry chapbook, brings humor to the Post Office and Little League, penetrates through pretentiousness to the deep archeological niches within us. These are poems of quintessential American sounds and seasons; the rustle of Sycamores, the staccato of cleats. Her language is full of music.

Published by The Orchard Street Press, copies may be ordered at: www.orchpress.com

Ulalume González de Leόn—Plagios/Plagarisms, Volume Two

A bilingual edition, translated by Terry Ehret, John Johnson, and Nancy J. Morales
Plagios/Plagiarisms, Volume Two is now available from Sixteen Rivers Press. 

Poet, essayist, and translator Ulalume González de Leόn believed that “Everything has already been said,” and thus each act of creation is a rewriting, reshuffling, and reconstructing of one great work. For this reason, she chose the title Plagios (Plagiarisms) for her book of collected poems. Nobel Laureate Octavio Paz called González de León “the best Mexicana poet since Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz,” recognizing the visionary quality of her work. This second of three bilingual volumes presents several short collections of poems González de Leόn produced from 1970 to 1975. Through her experimentation with unconventional syntax and borrowed texts, the poet skillfully blends anatomical, scientific, and philosophical vocabulary with richly erotic imagery to question our assumptions about identity and intimacy.

You can order on the Sixteen Rivers website, using this link: https://sixteenrivers.org/authors/gonzalez-de-leon/

Publication date: April 2, 2022
Paperback / 184 pages
ISBN: 978-1-939639-27-1
Price: $20

Kathleen Winter—Cat’s Tongue

Cat’s Tongue is the latest publication from Kathleen Winter, author of three award-winning poetry collections. Armed with wit, charm, and original imagery, she engages with incidents in her Texas youth that range from traumatic to ecstatic—strewing oilfields, deer, drug dealers, and football games in between. These poems vary widely in style and subject matter, but they share precisely crafted language and this writer’s unique perspective on a central Texas childhood.

Publication date: 3/15/22
Available now on pre-order through the distributor, Texas A&M University Press: www.tamupress.com/book/9781680032697/cats-tongue

Redwood Writers Club—Remember When: Fiction & Memoir Tales of Memories and Times Past

Polishing Mom’s silver spoons. Cheering on young baseball players. The streets of San Francisco in the sixties. Falling in love with a felon.

These are just some of the themes shared by members of the Redwood Writers branch in 2021’s anthology of fiction and true stories. In this collection of forty-nine tales, take a trip down memory lane as writers share about times past.

Edited by Shawn and Crissi Langwell

Available on Amazon: amzn.to/3EvSlRb

Molly Martin—Wonder Woman Electric to the Rescue

Molly Martin’s stories of growing up and her radical beginnings lead right into stories of her experiences as a woman in the trades. Molly was an organizer of women in the trades and was the heart and soul of Tradeswomen, Inc. for more than 40 years. She has a lot to say about women in non-traditional jobs, relating so many stories along the way. I was entertained by her direct speech and writing, often offering up little gems of rejoinders to her sexist co-workers. If you’ve ever been in the trades, you’ll love this book. If you’ve never been in the trades, this is a great introduction.

Available on Amazon

Michael David Fels—Bodies in Motion: Short Trips in An Expanding Universe

Bodies In Motion: Short Trips In An Expanding Universe is a collection of first-person memoirs, each of which casts a different light on the impact of movement/travel on the author. In these stories, Fels takes the reader to The Philippines, China, Dubai, Lebanon, Canada and Thailand as well as California, Kansas, New York, and New Mexico. Although Bodies In Motion can be enjoyed as a travel book, it is first and foremost an interior journey as Fels gains new understandings into himself and his world.

Book may be purchased at: www.MichaelDavidFels.com

Leeann Lidz—Adventures on the Gringo Trail: An Artist’s Awakening

In 1974, at the height of hippie culture, women’s liberation and sexual freedom, the author set off on a journey that lasted nineteen months through Central and South America and included the birth of her daughter in the Andean highlands of Ecuador. As an artist, she kept a journal of over 100 pen-and-ink and watercolor illustrations of the places she visited. Traveling with her eccentric boyfriend by train, plane, bus, ship and hitchhiking, she encountered many unusual situations and people and even a tropical disease that a local healer called leprosy. She tells the unique story of her travels and her evolution as an artist and mother living in Ecuador in a time before technology.

Available for pre-order at Barnes and Nobles and on Amazon. To be published February 9, 2022.

Ed Davis—The Last Professional

“With The Last Professional, Davis has done for American railroads what Kerouac did for American highways, and Steinbeck did for American nomads.” —Jerry Cimino, Founder of The Beat Museum.

This is a story of America! Lynden Hoover, a young man on the brink of a new beginning, cannot embrace it without confronting the traumas of his past. Help comes from The Duke, an old loner who calls America’s landscape his home. He clings to an honor code, but in fleeing from Short Arm, his merciless enemy, his code is being tested. At the end of the 20th century few Knights of the Road still cling to their vanishing lifestyle. The Duke mentors Lynden, enlisting old traveling friends to keep himself and his apprentice just ahead of Short Arm’s relentless pursuit. When two of those friends are murdered, the stakes become life or death.

Bonds are formed, secrets exposed, sacrifices made, trusts betrayed — all against a breathtaking American landscape of promise and peril. Three unforgettable characters hurtle toward a spellbinding climax where pasts and futures collide, and lives hang in the balance.

Available for pre-order at: https://bookshop.org/books/the-last-professional/9781951122256
Or at Readers Books in Sonoma.

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RWC Author Launch Books

The following books, featured at the Redwood Writers Club 2022 Author Launch (on February 19, 2022), were published in 2021. An announcement of Karen Misuraca’s Secret Sonoma: A Guide to the Weird, Wonderful, and Obscure was previously published on this site (see https://socolitupdate.com/sonoma-county-in-print/2021-soco-writers-in-print).

Richard Boyd—Irradiated: An Alien Perspective

Earth is awash in electromagnetic radiation. Much of it is in the radiofrequency, RF spectrum used by cell phones, Wi-Fi devices, and other forms of wireless technology. Medical science has shown that such RF radiation at the currently approved US levels causes harm to many forms of life, especially to children. Therefore, some European countries have adopted low levels of exposure near schools. But the Federal Communications Commission, has ignored the medical evidence. It takes an alien lady to bring the world to its senses.

Available on Amazon

Robbi Sommers Bryant—The Darkness

The Darkness is a harrowing journey into the depths of evil and the battle to overcome it.

“Bryant has scribbled a “black belt” thriller, showcasing her immense talent, ambition with technique, and wonderfully wild imagination. But more importantly, it’s readable as hell.”
—Joshua Mohr, Ophrah’s Book of the Month author

Available on Amazon

Joan Goodreau—Where to Next?

Joan Goodreau’s books are Where to Now? Strangers Together: How My Son’s Autism Changed My Life, and Another Secret Shared. Her poems, stories, and articles have appeared in numerous periodicals and anthologies in North America. Joan’s plays have appeared at local festivals. A Pushcart nominee, she has been awarded a Hedgebrook Writing Residency.

Available on Amazon

Cynthia Gregory—What Is Possible From Here

Cynthia Gregory’s collected stories, What is Possible From Here, explores the relationships that form meaning in our lives. Set in wildly different locations, stories unfold that connect us all. Gregory’s prose opens doors into strange and compelling worlds that tease us forward, inevitably, toward possibility.

Available on Amazon

Kathy Guthormsen—The Story of Jazz and Vihar

The Story of Jazz and Vihar is an educational tale sure to delight children and adults alike. Learn the important role that birds play in our ecology and how to best help them when you find one lost or injured in the wild.

Available on Amazon

Lenore Hirsch—
Schooled: Confessions of a Rookie Vice Principal

An obnoxious boss, troubled middle schoolers, angry parents, a few clueless teachers, and a little romance. What could go wrong for a new female vice principal? Remember your own school days, and laugh and cry as you watch Cynthia Walker stumble, find her way, stand up for what she believes, and perhaps find lasting love. 
LenoreHirsch.com

Available on Amazon

Karl Kadie—
Revenge of Nature

The poems in Revenge of Nature depict the powerful changes shaping our climate and planet. They highlight how people, animals, and other life forms are coping with nature and climate change. The key message is to rescue ourselves from climate change, we must personally experience it, physically, emotionally, and spiritually.

Available on Amazon

Bruce Koepp—Pitfall
(pen name, Bruce Ruben)

Pitfall is a romantic thriller set in the Minnesota north woods. The protagonist is a private forensic pathologist who serves families needing support and questions answered when it seems no one else cares. By coincidence, he finds himself caught up in a cold case of a young woman he once knew well in this rural lake country.

Available on Amazon

Joan Prebilich—
Some Men Must Live

Returned from the war as a survivor of the Burma-Thai death railroad, Michael Paxton resumes his civilian life as a reporter for the Sydney Times. When the Australian political climate turns against a free and open press, he’s determined to do the right thing. The question is: can he do it?

Purchase Joan’s book by emailing her at: joanprebilich@att.net

Rebecca Rosenberg—
Champagne Widows

2022 Historical Novel Society’s Editors’ Choice. In Champagne Widows, the widowed first woman of champagne grapples with a domineering partner, the complexities of making champagne, and six Napoleon wars. She battles pandemics, mental illness, wars, sexist laws, and even Napoleon to forge a champagne empire.

Available on Amazon

 

Steve Trenam—
An Affront to Gravity

“As the initial poem, “Full Circle,” suggests, the reader will want to return to these pages, again and again, meeting different versions of themselves, but also knowing that both the questions these poems elicit and the beauty they curate have no real end.”
—Megan Merchant, author of Before the Fevered Snow (Stillhouse Press, 2020)

Available on Amazon

Tommie Whitener—
California Vignettes: Some Stories

A collection of twelve short stories mainly about we more mature folks and running the subject-matter gamut from a man coming to grips with different sexuality after his wife dies, to grandparents second-guessing a planned move to another city to be closer to their grandchildren, to the eponymously named “The Asshole.”

Available on Amazon

Natasha Yim—
Luna’s Yum Yum Dim Sum

Luna and her family are celebrating her birthday with a dim sum lunch—Luna’s favorite. But when Luna drops a pork bun, she and her two brothers must figure out how to share five buns fairly. Should some siblings get more? Or should they cut the buns into smaller and smaller pieces? An introduction to simple division and fractions.

Available on Amazon