This Reference Librarian Uses His Horse Sense : Mystery novelist Jon L. Breen says his Rio Hondo College job, like picking a winning equine, requires detective work.

Reference librarian may seem an unlikely occupation for a man who writes murder mysteries set in the high-stakes, sometimes unsavory world of horse racing, but Jon L. Breen doesn’t see it that way.

As Breen likes to point out, “the reference librarian, like the horse picker, is in the detective business.”

As a librarian, Breen works in relative obscurity at Rio Hondo College in Whittier. But as a mystery writer and expert in the field, the Fountain Valley author maintains a high profile.

He’s a two-time winner of the Mystery Writers of America’s Edgar Award for his critical works: “What About Murder?: A Guide to Books About Mystery and Detective Fiction” (1981) and “Novel Verdicts: A Guide to Courtroom Fiction” (1984).

And at Bouchercon--the annual convention of mystery writers, publishers and fans held in Pasadena earlier this month--a collection of essays Breen co-edited with Martin H. Greenberg about religious detective fiction (“Synod of Sleuths”) earned him the Anthony Award for best critical book of 1990.

But it is as a mystery novelist that the 24-year veteran librarian once again has surfaced from the stacks.

His latest, “Hot Air” (Simon & Schuster; $19) is the fourth in a series featuring Southern California racetrack announcer/amateur sleuth Jerry Brogan.

This time out, Brogan is caught in the middle of a deadly family feud after murder shatters the retirement party of veteran Surfside Meadows jockey Brad Roark, who has been surprised with a “This Is Your Life” style reunion of relatives--relatives he prefers not to have seen again.

The racetrack setting of Breen’s previous Brogan mysteries (“Listen for the Click,” “Triple Crown” and “Loose Lips”) have led to comparisons to Dick Francis, the former champion British steeplechase jockey-turned-best-selling author whose mysteries also are set in the world of horse racing.

“Inevitably, when you write a mystery with a racing background the name of Dick Francis is invoked by the reviewers and if anyone compares me to Dick Francis I’m terrifically flattered,” said Breen, 47. “Francis is one of my favorite writers, but I’d say generally what I’m writing is not the same kind of mystery he writes for the most part. Most of his are more in the thriller category than the pure detective story.”

Breen’s interest in detective fiction began about the same time as his interest in horse r acing: Growing up in West Los Angeles, he began accompanying his parents to Hollywood Park when he was 12.

At one time he even considered becoming a racetrack announcer. But while he did some baseball and basketball play-by-play in the mid-’60s for the campus radio station at Pepperdine University, he earned a bachelor’s degree in English and went on to earn his master’s in library science from USC.

He also sold his first short story to Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine in 1967 when he was 23. He still writes an occasional story for the magazine and writes its book review column, The Jury Box.

But when he sat down to write his first mystery novel in the early ‘80s, Breen tapped both his interest in horse racing and his fascination with racetrack announcers to create the 30ish Jerry Brogan:

“He’s basically sort of an easy-going, tolerant person, but he does have this amateur detecting impulse, and I think as you look at the books you find that he really doesn’t get the amount of credit that he thinks he’s due for his detective work.”

Breen, who enjoys “the combination of whodunit plot with a sports event,” said he once wondered why horse racing makes a good background for a mystery.

“I figured the appeal of a detective story and the appeal of a horse race are kind of similar because in a traditional mystery you start out with a group of suspects--one of whom is guilty--and you’ve got a variety of evidence to look at to decide which one it is. In a horse race you have a group of horses--one of which will be the winner--and various clues that will hopefully point you to the right horse.”

Although the writer of traditional mysteries must write within a set of structural rules, Breen appreciates the fact that that genre allows him to tap as wide a range of backgrounds and subjects as possible.

For his own writing, he enjoys working key events in 20th-Century history into the plot.

“Although most of the books I write are set in the present, I frequently have some reverberation of a past event (such as) the internment of Japanese-Americans during World War II, the Hollywood blacklist.”

“Hot Air” reverberates back to the TV quiz show scandals of the late 1950s. Breen also touches upon various social issues such as land development and the use of animals in cosmetic research. (The Hot Air of the book’s title not only refers to the name of the horse that jockey Brad Roark rides in his last race but also the hot-air balloon that carries him away from his retirement ceremony at the racetrack).

For Breen, having a compelling puzzle for the reader to solve is a requisite to writing a mystery.

That’s his goal anyway.

“I think basically you have to have all the elements coming together and if you leave one out or let one slide you’re not going to have a successful book,” said Breen, who avoids writing detailed plot outlines for his books: “I want to be able to sit down and write and to surprise myself.”

Currently on sabbatical leave, Breen is writing supplements for his two award-winning reference books.

He’s also working on another mystery--the third in his other series featuring amateur detective Rachel Hennings, a book dealer who has a shop on Santa Monica Boulevard in Hollywood.

Although Breen follows horse racing closely in the newspapers, he and his wife, Rita, go to the track only a few times a year.

Indeed, he’s no fanatic.

“I think its wonderful spectator sport,” Breen said, laughing. “For me, it’s interesting enough without having to have a bet down.”

ORANGE COUNTY BOOK EVENTS

Book Signings: Mike Blake (“The Incomplete Book of Baseball Superstitions, Rituals and Oddities” and “The Minor Leagues: A Celebration of the Little Show”) will sign from 1 to 3 p.m. Saturday at Book Star in the Brea Marketplace, 975 E. Birch St. . . . Caryn Lea Summers (“Circle of Health”) will sign from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m. Saturday at Fahrenheit 451 Books, 509 S. Coast Highway, Laguna Beach. She’ll also give a lecture (fee: $10). . . . Sam Halpert (“When We Talk About Raymond Carver”) will read and sign from 3 to 5 p.m. Sunday at Upchurch-Brown Booksellers, 384 Forest Ave., Laguna Beach. . . . Children’s book illustrator Felicia Bond (“If You Give a Mouse a Cookie”) will sign from 3 to 5 p.m. Tuesday at Children’s Book Cottage, 30100 Town Center Drive, Laguna Niguel.

One-Man Show: Jonathan Frid, who starred in TV’s “Dark Shadows,” will present a one-man storytelling show featuring the works of such diverse writers as Edgar Allan Poe and Groucho Marx at 8 p.m. Saturday in the Forum Theater, 4175 Fairmont Blvd., Yorba Linda. Tickets: $10. For more information, call (714) 779-8591.

Halloween Treat: Members of the Undead Poets Society will recite vampire and horror poetry in costume from 7 to 9 p.m. Sunday at Fahrenheit 451 Books, 509 S. Coast Highway, Laguna Beach. For more information, call (714) 494-5151.

Champlin Speaks: Author and former Los Angeles Times critic-at-large Charles Champlin will read from his newspaper stories and segments of his autobiography, “Back There Where the Past Was,” at Steve Mellow’s Readers’ Theatre at 7:30 p.m. Tuesday at Newport Center Library, 856 San Clemente Drive. Free. Champlin also will read at the Readers’ Theatre meeting at 7:30 p.m. Wednesday at the San Juan Capistrano Regional Library, 31495 El Camino Real.

Used Books: The Canyon Hills Library will hold its annual used-book sale from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. Saturday at the library, 400 S. Scout Trail, Anaheim.

PEN OC: Alejandro Morales, author and co-founder of PEN Orange County, will moderate a panel discussion of Ethnic Images in the Press from 2 to 4 p.m. Saturday in the Tustin Main Library, 345 E. Main St. Panelists will include Maria Newman, formerly of the Los Angeles Times, Valerie Takahama of the Orange County Register, Fernando Velo of Azteca News, Yen Do, editor of Nguoi Viet and free-lance journalist Victor Valle. Free.