Southern Arizona Authors

“The Grieving Process: Letting Go with Love,” 3rd Edition by Nancy O’Connor, Ph.D. La Mariposa Press. $22.95; Kindle $18.98.

Grieving is inevitable to the human experience, but the bereaved are rarely prepared for the psychological wounds that accompany the loss of a loved one. These wounds must be healed, says psychologist Nancy O’Connor, and working through one’s grief, rather than avoiding it, is a necessary part of the healing process. Dr. O’Connor, now retired, was the director of both Tucson’s Grief and Loss Center and La Mariposa Counseling Center; with this sensitive and thorough volume she offers gentle advice that identifies the roots of the roiled emotions that come in the wake of a death, and provides a blueprint for moving forward. The book begins with universal experiences involved in loss, then drills down to the particulars of a variety of contingencies, such as coping with the death of a spouse, parent, child, or other family members, extending even to the loss of friends and pets. Special circumstances — such as death by suicide or violence — are included, as is a section on facing a terminal diagnosis with grace. Useful chapters on caregiving, end of life issues, and support groups round out this edifying book. “The Grieving Process” was originally published in 1984; this is the third edition, revised and enlarged.

— Helene Woodhams

“In Another Time” by Jillian Cantor. Harper. $26.99; paperback $16.99; Kindle $11.99.

Music is the food of love and the key to survival in Jillian Cantor’s latest historical novel, an elegantly told story of star-crossed lovers separated by time and fate on the brink of the second World War. It opens in 1946 with a young violinist who awakens to find herself in a field outside Berlin with no notion of how she got there. The last thing she recalls is playing Mahler for her lover in his bookshop, an episode that, she is dismayed to learn, took place 10 years previously. The intervening years are gone from her memory and her lover has disappeared; lacking a past, she must struggle to move forward. Her lover’s story, told in alternating chapters, provides the counterpoint to hers, describing their five-year romance leading up to the eventful evening in 1936, and delicately revealing a closely held secret he hopes will save her from the growing Nazi threat. Cantor, who lives in Tucson, has authored several critically acclaimed novels set during World War II and its aftermath. Poignant and rich with historical detail, the compulsively readable “In Another Time” is a worthy addition to her outstanding body of work.

— Helene Woodhams

“Penelope the Pooting Spider: An Epic Arachnid Battle for the Environment” by R.L. Clayton and Abby Pickering. R. Clayton International Enterprise Inc. $9.99; $3.99 digital.

Pity the poor spider, so often misunderstood by those she benefits the most. Five-year-old Julia has extinction in mind for Penelope, the creepy spider living under her playhouse, but mom dissuades her. Spiders, she says, eat bugs we don’t like. This is a smart call on mom’s part — Penelope goes on to validate mom’s good opinion when she mobilizes the other creatures in the backyard in an all-out assault on the Zika-carrying mosquitos that have made Julia sick. Penelope saves the day by eradicating the biting pests and, by extension, warding off the health department workers who threatened to spray poison all over the yard to kill the mosquitos (along with the rest of the backyard ecosystem). R.L. Clayton’s lesson in natural pest control was inspired and co-authored by his granddaughter, and is his first children’s book. A resident of Tucson, he has also authored a science fiction trilogy, a thriller series, and a historical novel.

— Helene Woodhams

“The A List” by J.A. Jance. Gallery Books. $27.99. On sale April 2, 2019.

Women feature prominently in J.A. Jance’s new Ali Reynolds mystery — protagonists, antagonists, and even a “female” artificial intelligence sleuth. When a ginger-haired young man — the product of a fertility-clinic — develops life-threatening kidney disease, his mother takes to television to plead for a donor. When another ginger-haired young man — also the product of that clinic — responds, the ethics of the ginger-haired clinic doctor get challenged. He doesn’t take that well. After a botched cover-up, a murder, and subsequent conviction and imprisonment for life, the fertility doctor makes a “kill” list and starts to take revenge on everyone he blames for his downfall. Since it was her TV interview that brought the fraud to light, that includes Ali. After more murders, a couple of women and an AI named Frigg set out to find the doctor’s accomplices and save the last two on the kill (the “A”) list.

— Christine Wald-Hopkins

“Love Handles” by Esmeralda La Court. Court Press Books. $10.95; also available on Kindle.

Billed as “an insider’s undercover exposé of a particular Tucson ladies’ spa,” fictional “Love Handles” plays around, romping between Pilates classes and massage beds. Serenity Spa caters to well-fed wives of fat-cat husbands. It offers handsome trainers who address wives’ needs and obviate husbands’ obligations. The business continues swimmingly until a greedy spa corporation comes to town and a pretty reporter dons lesbian motorcycle gear and goes undercover to investigate. Tension then becomes palpable: Can Mike hold onto the spa he’s worked so hard to build? Will the reporter get her story, and snag the virginal farm boy? Will Mrs. Atkins and Mrs. Fulman finally lay off the peanut butter-cream Kit Kats? No, “Love Handles” doesn’t take itself seriously. Around what amounts to a love story, the novel goes raunchy with excesses of the graceless rich, a spa-centered lifestyle, and casual business corruption. There’s a lot of sex in this book, but it doesn’t try to be erotic; and it actually feels more locker room than nail salon. Worth noting is that the prose of Esmeralda La Court, (she, occupied “for many years in the spa industry, both on and off the mat”) is deft, informed, and bawdy. That makes it not unlike the deft, informed, and bawdy prose of another writer published by this press — Jon Court.

— Christine Wald-Hopkins

“Whimsical Limericks from the Age of Trump from All Sides of the Political Divide” by E. Reid Gilbert. Cover illustrations by David Fitzsimmons. A3D Impressions. $11.95; Kindle $2.95.

There once was a pastor from Tucson

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Who lamented the world he saw news on

So he whipped out his pen

And skewered the men

In whose handbasket he saw all of youse gone.

Now this pastor is also a mime

I imagine him spending his time

(“Don’t go mad, get even”

In this POTUS season)

Signing “what with ‘Scaramucci’ will rhyme?”

So … limericks are never high verse

And this critic’s hardly averse

To snobbishly carping

That literature’s warping

But for satire, you well could do worse.

— Christine Wald-Hopkins

“The Sunny Side of Death” by Bruce E. Weber. Stanfield Books. $11.99.

In the name of love, Henry Falk — a deep-rooted land junkie — agrees to accompany his girlfriend on her sailing adventure across the Atlantic. Armed with a drug cocktail to prevent his acute seasickness and the resulting erratic sex drive, Henry floats between nausea, panic and fleeting bouts of eroticism until a killer storm sends 10-foot swells — swamping the boat and flushing Henry into the ocean. Suffering from dysentery, delirium, starvation and dehydration, Henry’s battles to survive play out in painstaking detail as he drifts along in his makeshift floating shelter. While the elements pummel him, Henry ruminates about his past, fallen girlfriend, adoptive parents and numerous literary quotes and storylines. After almost two months at sea, Henry rescues a Filipino woman who jumped ship to escape human trafficking. When both are swooped from the sea by the crew on a sailing vessel, Henry battles between the potential comfort of new love and civilization and the siren song of the sea calling him back. Weber writes novels and story collections. This is his eighth book.

— Vicki Ann Duraine

“Golden Arms, aka Test Pilots: Six Years that Changed Aerial Warfare” by Michael Williams with Lance Grace. Sunstone Press. $60.00; paperback $4.78.

Few can imagine a daily job of “chasing” aircraft, camera in-hand at 49,000 feet, waiting for that split-second perfect shot but, shortly after enlisting in the U.S. Air Force, Williams received motion-picture photography training and the sky was the limit. While Williams always got his shots, during the first year his chase pilot toyed with the newbie by executing harrowing descents — leaving Williams to measure his progress by how close he could get back to the airfield without vomiting. Readers will admire his grit after viewing the accompanying photos. Williams’ detailed accounts of his experiences at the White Sands Missile Range is sure to appeal to aircraft and military buffs, and photographers. Chapters include air-to-air and air-to-ground, heavy iron drones, and various missions. In addition to the inspiring photographs, and technical and anecdotal information of the numerous flight tests, Williams provides specifications of both the aircrafts and his camera equipment and techniques. Williams served in the Air Force for 26 years, much as a senior master sergeant and flight test photographer. Aerospace advertisements and periodicals have featured his award-winning aerial images. During 10 of his 20 years in the Air Force, Grace served as a command and test pilot — flying over 4,500 hours in 50 types of aircraft.

— Vicki Ann Duraine