Jo-Ann Mapson

7PM THURSDAY, AUGUST 14 Jo-Ann Mapson: Owen's Daughter LOCATION: CHANGING HANDS TEMPE

The award-winning author of Hank & Chloe presents her new literary novel about two women — one a young mother newly out of rehab, the other a painter just diagnosed with a progressive disease — who are both connected to the same troubled man and his wayward daughter.

Jo-Ann Mapson also hosts a writing workshop preceding this event at 4pm. More info »

Skye Elliot is given a choice after her car accident — jail or rehab — and her ex-husband, a bull rider who introduced her to the party scene, gets custody of their four-year-old daughter Gracie. It takes Skye eight months to get clean, but the day she is released, she has one plan: to be a good mother — better, at least, than Skye's own selfish mother and absent dad.

Owen Garret hasn't seen his daughter in ten years. He, too, needs to make amends. Newly out of prison, he picks her up from rehab and together they set off to find Gracie, and to forge a relationship that transcends the hurt and anger that have brewed between them for almost a decade. In the meantime, they find Margaret Yearwood, too — Owen's lost love whom he left when he turned himself in for a long-ago crime.

Owen's Daughter is a stand-alone novel that brings back characters from Mapson's treasured novel Blue rodeo, and introduces them to the beloved cast of Solomon's Oak and Finding Casey. With its father-daughter story and characters who overcome personal failings against great odds, Owen's Daughter is a story of love and family that will enchant Mapson fans both old and new.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR Jo-Ann Mapson, a third generation Californian, dropped out of college to marry, but later finished a creative writing degree at California State University, Long Beach. Mapson is the author of the acclaimed novels Shadow Ranch, Blue rodeo, Hank & Chloe, and Loving Chloe. Setting her fiction in the Southwest, Mapson writes about a region that she knows well; after growing up in California and living for a time in Arizona and New Mexico, Mapson lives today in Costa Mesa, California. She attributes her focus on setting to the influence of Wallace Stegner.

Location: Street: 6428 S McClintock Dr. City: Tempe, Province: Arizona Postal Code: 85283 Country: United States (added from IndieBound)… (more)

4-6PM THURSDAY, AUGUST 14 Writing Workshop with Jo-Ann Mapson: "I Am From" LOCATION: CHANGING HANDS TEMPE

The award-winning author of Hank & Chloe hosts a writing workshop that asks participants to draw from their own lives to put together a plot, story, and narrator.

Jo-Ann Mapson also presents and signs her new book Owen's Daughter following this workshop at 7pm. More info »

Inspired by bestselling literary author Mary Pipher's Writing to Change the World, Mapson guides participants through writing exercises that use their own experiences to create material. She asks aspiring authors to write out their own ancestry and pair it with concrete images in order to construct the structure of a story.

WORKSHOP DETAILS Cost: One (1) copy of Owen's Daughter. Registration and pre-payment at 480.730.0205.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR Jo-Ann Mapson, a third generation Californian, dropped out of college to marry, but later finished a creative writing degree at California State University, Long Beach. Mapson is the author of the acclaimed novels Shadow Ranch, Blue Rodeo, Hank & Chloe, and Loving Chloe. Setting her fiction in the Southwest, Mapson writes about a region that she knows well; after growing up in California and living for a time in Arizona and New Mexico, Mapson lives today in Costa Mesa, California. She attributes her focus on setting to the influence of Wallace Stegner.

Location: Street: 6428 S McClintock Dr. City: Tempe, Province: Arizona Postal Code: 85283 Country: United States (added from IndieBound)… (more)

"Reuniting cherished characters from Solomon's Oak (2010) and Finding Casey (2012), Mapson introduces yet another fetching cast of fragile yet resilient personalities who warmly work their ways into readers' hearts." --Booklist

"Moving . . . Mapson delves deeply into the messy, complex relationships between characters, while rendering the New Mexico landscape so beautifully that it emerges as an additional member of the cast. She has a particularly strong feel for human-animal bonds, creating four-legged (and in one unfortunate case, three-legged) characters that are as distinctive as the human variety." --Publishers Weekly

Skye Elliot is given a choice after her car accident--jail or rehab--and her ex-husband, a bull rider who introduced her to the party scene, gets custody of their four-year-old daughter Gracie. It takes Skye eight months to get clean, but the day she is released, she has one plan: to be a good mother--better, at least, than Skye's own selfish mother and absent dad. Owen Garret hasn't seen his daughter in ten years. He, too, needs to make amends. Newly out of prison, he picks her up from rehab and together they set off to find Gracie, and to forge a relationship that transcends the hurt and anger that have brewed between them for almost a decade. In the meantime, they find Margaret Yearwood, too--Owen's lost love whom he left when he turned himself in for a long-ago crime. Owen's Daughter is a stand-alone novel that brings back characters from Mapson's treasured novel Blue Rodeo, and introduces them to the beloved cast of Solomon's Oak and Finding Casey. With its father-daughter story and characters who overcome personal failings against great odds, Owen's Daughter is a story of love and family that will enchant Mapson fans both old and new.

Jo-Ann Mapson, a third generation Californian, grew up in Fullerton as a middle child with four siblings. She dropped out of college to marry, but later finished a creative writing degree at California State University, Long Beach. Following her son's birth in 1978, Mapson worked an assortment of odd jobs teaching horseback riding, cleaning houses, typing resumes, and working retail. After earning a graduate degree from Vermont College's low residency program, she taught at Orange Coast College for six years before turning to full-time writing in 1996.Jo-Ann Mapson is the author of eleven previous novels, including the beloved Finding Casey, Solomon's Oak, Hank & Chloe, Blue Rodeo (CBS TV movie), and the Los Angeles Times bestsellers The Wilder Sisters and Bad Girl Creek. She lives in Santa Fe, New Mexico, with her husband and their three dogs. Visit her website at www.joannmapson.com.

Location: Street: 4022 Rio Grande Blvd NW City: Albuquerque, Province: New Mexico Postal Code: 87107-3157 Country: United States (added from IndieBound)… (more)

7PM WEDNESDAY, OCTOBER 17 Jo-Ann Mapson: Finding Casey  Award-winning novelist Jo-Ann Mapson presents Finding Casey.

Glory Vigil, newly married, unexpectedly pregnant at forty-one, is nesting in the home she and her husband have just moved to in Santa Fe. Their adopted daughter, Juniper, is home from college for Thanksgiving and in love for the first time, quickly learning how a relationship changes everything. But Juniper has a tiny arrow lodged in her heart, a leftover shard from the day eight years earlier when her sister, Casey, disappeared—in a time before she'd ever met Glory and her husband. When a fieldwork course takes Juniper to a pueblo only a few hours away, she finds herself right back in the past she thought she'd finally buried.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR Jo-Ann Mapson is the author of Hank & Chloe, Blue rodeo (now a CBS TV movie starring Kris Kristofferson), Shadow Ranch, Loving Chloe, The Wilder Sisters, the Bad Girl Creek trilogy, The Owl & Moon Cafe, and Solomon's Oak. Finding Casey is her eleventh novel.

Location: Street: 6428 S McClintock Dr. City: Tempe, Province: Arizona Postal Code: 85283 Country: United States (added from IndieBound)… (more)

Glory Vigil, newly married, unexpectedly pregnant at forty-one, is nesting in the home she and her husband, Joseph, have just moved to in Santa Fe, a house that unbeknownst to them is rumored to have a resident ghost. Their adopted daughter, Juniper, is home from college for Thanksgiving and in love for the very first time, quickly learning how a relationship changes everything. But Juniper has a tiny arrow lodged in her heart, a leftover shard from the day eight years earlier when her sister, Casey, disappeared-in a time before she'd ever met Glory and Joseph. When a fieldwork course takes Juniper to a pueblo only a few hours away, she finds herself right back in the past she thought she'd finally buried. A love story, a family story, a story of searching and the bond between sisters, Finding Casey is a testament to human resilience. This completely stand-alone novel, featuring beloved characters from Solomon's Oak, will charm Mapson's readers and move her into a larger sphere.

Location: Street: 4022 Rio Grande Blvd NW City: Albuquerque, Province: New Mexico Postal Code: 87107-3157 Country: United States (added from IndieBound)… (more)

Judi Hendricks; Jo-Ann Mapson

Santa Fe fiction writers Judi Hendricks and Jo-Ann Mapson interview each other, asking each other the questions they've always wished interviewers would ask. They will talk about their work, the writing life, and read excerpts from their books. Books will be available for purchase. Jo-Ann Mapson is the author of a book of stories, Fault Line, many anthologized essays, and nine novels, most recently The Owl and Moon Café and the Bad Girl Creek series. Two of her books have been national bestsellers, and her book Blue Rodeo was made into a TV movie starring Kris Kristofferson. She teaches fiction at the University of Alaska's MFA in Creative Writing program. Armed with a degree in journalism and a short attention span, Judith Ryan Hendricks worked as a journalist, copywriter, computer instructor, travel agent, waitress and baker before turning to fiction writing. Her first novel, Bread Alone was a national bestseller and a Booksense 76 pick. It was followed by Isabel's Daughter, set in Santa Fe, and The Baker's Apprentice. Her newest book, The Laws of Harmony, was published in February, 2009. Hendricks' fiction has been translated into 11 languages and distributed in more than 15 countries. Sponsored by the Friends of the Santa Fe Public Library. (libros)… (more)