Southern Arizona Authors

By jokeharmonica and ¡hey pedro! (Piltdown Man Publishing, $10; available at Mostly Books, Antigone Books, and Revolutionary Grounds)

So ... how could you describe a 5-by 7-inch, 69-page, hand-lettered, witty, visual parable about the meaning of life (illustrated with colorful “original ... collages ... re-assembled, re-worked, and re-created …on a table in a sun room … using a Pentel ‘Stylo,’ colored pencils, kitchen shears, a glue stick, masking tape, and a great deal of humor .... ”)?

In one word: Delightful.

Five more words: Buy one for a friend.

An American Soldier in the Great War: The World War I diary and Letters of Elmer O. Smith

Edited by John DellaGiustina (Hellgate Press, $21.95)

In 1916, Elmer O. Smith was a Michigan farm boy working in a restaurant and trying to study at night in town. The concerns in his letters home include the state of the farm, family health, and dance parties. In 1918, Smith was a 21-year-old Army private at war in France.

The concerns in his letters home include the state of the farm, his father’s health, and how the shrapnel embedded in his chest won’t bother him. Remarkably, the tone in those letters hardly changes. What we see in “An American Soldier in the Great War” is an unassuming man who played a quiet part in a momentous event.

Tucsonan John DellaGiustina, a retired U.S. Army Military Intelligence officer, collected and edited the diary and letters of his mother’s father for this work. To avoid being drafted, Smith joined the Michigan National Guard. However, his Guard unit was federalized, and he ended up in the 119th Field Artillery Regiment, which went to the front in the war against Germany. DellaGiustina situates Smith’s diary and letters in the larger context of a World War I history, and the book ends up an informative, very readable portrait.

Dead and Dead for Real

By R. L. Clayton (R.L. Clayton. Print, $14.99; e-book, $3.99)

An unexpected character appears late in this thriller by Tucsonan R.L. Clayton: Conscience, and the question of good and evil—in the form of disembodied voice.

Central characters Katherine (Kiki) Russell and Nick Sabino, veterans of the conflict in Afghanistan, have discovered a plot by terrorists to infiltrate and attack Americans within the country. It began with the murders of families of U.S. service personnel who fought in the Middle East — the family of Kiki, a top-notch sniper — being among the first. Initially to exact revenge, and later, to prevent further killings, Nick and Kiki develop an excruciatingly effective psychological technique for interrogating bad guys. A slip-up gets Kiki kidnapped, and Nick needs police help, but that then catalyzes the “alphabet soup” brigade — FBI, CIA, etc.—and questions of motive, jurisdiction, and conscience arise.

Intuitive/Counterintuitive: The Structure of Religion and Science

By Richard C. Johnson, PhD ($37.52; $7. e-book).

In “Intuitive/Counterintuitive,” research chemist Richard C. Johnson further develops arguments he laid out in his two previous books, “Religion: The Failed Narrative” and “The Human Identity Problem.” Drawing on the writing of Daniel Kahneman, he posits the theory that religious belief is an outgrowth of instinct, a primitive drive necessary for human survival.

The human realm of reason — along with science — can be tapped to decipher the weaknesses in instinct that would drive human beings to adopt religion or believe in the “Man-in-the-Sky.” It is difficult to be an atheist in contemporary America, Johnson asserts, but reason and science are the atheist’s tools for support and making sense of life.

Journey to the Heart of the Condor: Love, Loss, and Survival

in a South

American Dictatorship

By Emily C. Creigh and Dr. Martin Almada (Casa Sartori, $17.50)

Hotel Guaraní, a luxury hotel in Asunción, Paraguay, serves as a pivot point for this compelling dual narrative. It’s the venue for much-appreciated rest and relaxation for U.S. Peace Corps volunteers. It’s also where prisoners from a clandestine prison are dispatched to scavenge leftovers to feed other inmates.

From 1975 to 1977, Tucsonan Emily C. Creigh was one of those Peace Corps volunteers. Paraguayan Martin Almada was an educator and political prisoner. In “Journey to the Heart of the Condor,” Creigh and Almada tell their separate stories in alternating chapters of life under the Alfredo Stroessner dictatorship. Almada’s is harrowing, starting with his Kafkaesque arrest, interrogation, and sadistic torture over a thousand days of incarceration.

It continues with horrific accounts of torture and murder of innocents under the sanction of Operation Condor, an international anticommunist campaign supported by the U.S. Creigh’s tale — chirpy, guileless, patriotic, well-intentioned — exemplifies the American attitude toward “anti-communist” dictatorial regimes in the 1970s. Creigh’s and Almada’s stories can each stand alone, but they are a devastating indictment read together.

The Ancient Southwest: A Guide

to Archeological

Sites

By Gregory McNamee with photographs by Larry Lindahl (Rio Nuevo, $16.95)

It’s been out for a while (2014), but so have its subjects (tens of thousands of years), and this stunning book deserves a mention. “The Ancient Southwest” covers art, artifacts, and structures from the “core Southwest” — modern Arizona and New Mexico, eastern Utah and southwestern Colorado.

Writer Gregory McNamee and photographer Larry Lindahl take us through 50 sites — national and state parks, monuments, and significant locales — providing archaeological history and images of pottery, baskets, jewelry, weavings, and petroglyphs and pictographs organized by state. The striking colors (sunsets, reds, sky blues), the angles, and contrasts of Lindahl’s photographs rival the spectacular rock art of Nine Mile Canyon Petroglyphs or the pueblos of Mesa Verde he’s captured.

An American Miner in Peru: A Lesson in Patience and Perseverance

By Chuck Preble. (Wheatmark. Amazon, $9.95 printed; 7.99 e-book)

In “An American Miner in Peru,” Chuck Preble chronicles his career working for the Southern Peru Copper Corporation, 15 of those as president and chief executive officer. Preble describes family life (he married a woman he met there, and they raised two sons in the camp and in Lima); challenges of copper extraction, pollution mitigation, and labor relations.

Preble organizes his book according to who was in power at the time, from democratically-elected presidents to military dictatorships. The fate of foreign-owned companies depended on the politics of the time.

The Cadet Nurse Corps in Arizona:

A History of Service

By Elsie M. Szecsy, with a foreword by Richard Carmona (Arcadia Publishing and The History Press, $21.99)

Former ASU academic professional Elsie M. Szecsy includes Tucson’s St. Mary’s Hospital School of Nursing in this book highlighting the work of Arizona nurses during the Second World War. Szecsy was inspired by her mother’s experience as a cadet to investigate the role of cadet nurses during the war.

She provides background —the chronic nursing shortage since World War I, segregated training facilities, and increased need due to the war effort — that gave rise to the U.S. Cadet Nurse Corps. She describes the establishment of five corps facilities in Arizona, their success rates, and profiles of Arizona women who participated in the program. She discusses issues of race and ethnicity in nurses’ training, addresses Japanese-American internment in Arizona, and includes photographs and rosters of Cadet Nurse Corps participants.

The Autobiography of Brutus Buckeye: As Told to His Parents Sally Lanyon and Ray Bourhis

By Sally Lanyon and Ray Bourhis (Orange Frazer Press, $19.95)

An anecdotal and pictorial retrospective of the Ohio State mascot, Brutus Buckeye from its conception in 1965 through its various versions to today.

A labor of love from Lanyon and Bourhis — Ohio State alumni and creators of the original Brutus — and of regional interest.

The Day Hal Quit

By Jim Christ (Joseph and Associates, $9.95)

Tara was a rebellious and independent teenager but after thugs bludgeon her mother during a robbery, she starts living with abandonment, shuffling her college studies with drug running. While making a drop, the last thing Tara and her Yaqui boyfriend Caje expect is running into a psychotic redneck who recognizes an easy score. What he doesn’t realize is that Tara comes armed. In addition to a machine gun, she has another weapon – her friend Hal. But will his arsenal be enough to get her way out of this jam? A debut novel and fast ride through the desert and grass country of Southern Arizona.

The Knights at the Round Table: Life’s Funny Moments and Eclectic Recipes to Match!

By Judith Knight (Xlibris, $14.71)

Tucson author Knight serves up a main course of recipes with a side-dish of anecdotes, utilizing cooking and baking shortcuts including her favorite brand of mayonnaise and onions (Vidalia) in these user-friendly recipes sure to please any palate. The only missing ingredient is accompanying photographs.