Local Authors’ Works to Fill Shelves in 1994

Orange County authors had a banner year in 1993 and the new year promises to offer more of the same. In addition to new novels by best-selling Elizabeth George and Dean Koontz, here are more titles to keep an eye out for in 1994:

Veteran Newport Beach romance writer Suzanne Forster’s “Shameless” is described as a “sexy commercial woman’s novel” and Berkley Publishing Group is billing it as Forster’s “breakout debut.” It’s due out in February. . . . “Fool’s Puzzle,” Fountain Valley writer Earlene Fowler’s debut murder mystery, set in central California, is due in May. . . . “Trade-Off,” Maxine O’Callaghan’s fifth Delilah West mystery, will be out in June: It seems like a routine case about a missing teen-age girl until scrappy Orange County private eye West finds a decomposing corpse next door to the girl’s home. . . . Noreen Ayres, another Mission Viejo resident, returns in August with “Carcass Trade,” the second in her Smokey Brandon series of mysteries about an Orange County forensic specialist.

And then there are these forthcoming novels from the UC Irvine’s acclaimed graduate Program in Writing:

“Understand This”--a gritty novel about teen-agers living in South Central Los Angeles--by Jervey Tervalon (Class of ‘92) will be out in February. . . . “Consider This Home” by Greg Bills (Class of ‘91) has a spring release. It’s about a Mormon woman and her son who flee Utah to begin a new life in Las Vegas but must return to Utah to face the woman’s past and the boy’s stepfather, who wants to immerse his son in the church. . . . “Simple Prayers”--a historical novel about the black plague by Michael Golding (Class of ‘92)--hits bookstores in April. . . . And out in July: “Saudade,” by Katherine Vaz (Class of ‘91). It’s about an older Portuguese man and a young woman who learn to go on living after experiencing personal losses (July).