Mysteries of the Southwest

Several readers have written in to the Personalized Good Reads service asking for mysteries set in the Southwest. Most people using the service are avid readers and have already exhausted the complete works of Tony Hillerman and J. A. Jance. While I was thinking of a reply for the patron, I came across Steven F. Havill's latest book, One Perfect Shot. This book is a prequel to a long running series set in Posadas County, New Mexico. The main character is an Deputy Sheriff Bill Gastner and Estelle Reyes is a new hire for the department. This prequel does an excellent job of setting the stage for a series - solid plot, well defined characters, a great sense of the place. I went on to pick up another book in the series, Double Prey, to find Estelle Reyes-Guzman as a seasoned Deputy Sheriff. I'm looking forward to going back at my leisure to fill in the missing years.

Read on for more mystery series set in the Southwest.

Happy New You!

What are your New Year's resolutions? Learning a new skill, traveling the world, reinventing yourself, or getting around to something you've put off for a while? I just put up a display of books to help get you started. Here's the virtual version!

• Freerunning and parkour amp running and jogging up a notch, into an extreme sport. Do you dare try?
• Get crafty! Arizona's own Crafty Chica writes about sparkly, fun, Mexican-heritage-inspired crafts, not to mention fashion and style. She even penned a little crafty fiction! And you can save the planet by delighting your friends and family with recycled crafts from Recyclo-Gami, Craft Activism, Upcycling, or Steampunk Emporium.
• Take an offbeat vacation with The Lonely Planet Guide to Experimental Travel. Challenge your travel-mates to a game of "Trip Poker": winner picks a destination...and loser pays. Already have a destination in mind? We keep some always-available guidebooks in our ebook collection.Visit our digital downloads page and see if we have the right one for you! (P.S. If one of your resolutions involves reading classics, we have plenty of free public domain ebooks available that don't count against your checkout limit and never expire.)
• Create something really important, a lasting video record of a life-and death struggle where all of human existence hangs in the balance. That's right, I'm talking about making your own zombie movie with Filming the Undead!
• A lot of resolutions involve diet and exercise. Our collection includes books that run the gamut from vegan diets to pilates to fat acceptance; something for everyone!
• Maybe all this talk about diet got you thinking about growing your own food. We have a wide selection of gardening books, and we've got an awesome seed library to check out...literally!
• Finally, do you have trouble sticking to your resolutions, feeling like they're important, or even remembering them after a few months? (Me too!) This Year I Will offers tips on making lasting changes in your life. And although I have a pretty low tolerance for the self-help genre, Sark always makes me feel creative and inspired.

But library resources don't end with books! Visit our website to...

• Learn a language,
• Research your family's genealogy,
• Find articles, instruction videos, and more for all kinds of hobbies,
• Or start a business!

We also offer a wide variety of free classes in person at your local branch, where you can learn anything from computer basics to GED prep to languages to photo editing to Excel!

What are your resolutions? How do you use the library help you reach your goals?

Fact and Fiction at the Tucson Festival of Books

Jess Walter is high on my list of authors to meet at the Tucson Festival of Books, because I love his novel on how not to cope with the current economic crisis in The Financial Lives of the Poets. Matt Prior is a likable Everyman who has lost his job as a business reporter and is within days of losing his upside down-mortgaged house. His wife has filled their garage with junk from the Home Shopping Network, and he's afraid that she's having an affair with the high school flame she found on Facebook. Caring for his senile father is another of Matt's challenges and he can't afford to keep his sons in their over-priced private school, even though he knows they won't survive the predatory jungle of public education. His attempt to launch a website where financial advice is given in poetry is a failure: people don't seem to want economic updates delivered in iambic pentameter or haiku.

What, then, do people want? The answer comes to him in a flash, when a chance encounter with some gang bangers at a convenience store results in him getting stoned for the first time in many years. Of course! Middle-aged folks are longing for marijuana! And selling pot is a recession-proof business. Not surprisingly, this doesn't turn to be the best idea for saving his bacon that Matt could have had, but it's by no means the last bad decision he'll make in this hilarious satire on The-way-we-live-now-but-really-wish-we-didn't. Multiple "What was he thinking?" moments will keep you turning pages.

Still on the subject of business reporters--nonfictional this time--I also plan to check in on Michael Hiltzik, Pulitzer Prize-winning business reporter for the LA Times, and author of Colossus: Hoover Dam and the Making of the American Century. Hiltzik digs deep into the social, economic and political factors that surrounded the construction of this eternal symbol of the Southwest, and places them in an environmental and historical context that is as eye-opening as it is informative.

Hundreds of authors will be at the Tucson Festival of Books, March 12 and 13 on the UA Mall. And, it's all free, even the parking. You absolutely can't afford to miss it!

Helene

Follow the book title links to the Library's catalog for these and other great titles by authors appearing at the Book Festival.