Date: Fri 21-May-1999

Publication: Bee

Author: SHANNO

Quick Words:

Mapson-Speart-Porter-horses

Full Text:

Popular Authors Will Be Visiting Newtown

(with book covers)

BY SHANNON HICKS

The Book Review in Sand Hill Plaza will host two book signing events within

the next week, the first of which will be with a lady who has just signed her

second contract with Avon Books to continue her popular US Fish and Wildlife

Agent Rachel Porter series of mysteries. The second event will be with a lady

who has become one of the hottest western-style writers in recent years.

Easton resident Jessica Speart will be in Newtown on Saturday, May 22,

beginning at 2 pm, to meet fans for a few hours at the southern Newtown book

store.

Mrs Speart began her Rachel Porter series three years ago. She has been

writing non-fiction for about ten years. The fictional US Fish & Wildlife

Agent Porter came about came about as both a catharsis for what Mrs Speart was

uncovering while researching some of her freelance magazine articles and as a

way to reach more of the general public about the plight of wildlife within

the United States.

"A lot of this evolved out of the work I did as an investigative journalist,"

the author said this week. Mrs Speart has done articles for publications

ranging from The New York Times Sunday Magazine (concerning drugs being

smuggled into the country hidden in animals) and Wildlife Conservation to Omni

, Modern Maturity (focusing on a Fish & Wildlife agent over the age of 50) and

even Travel & Leisure (regarding products that are illegal to bring into the

country).

In researching her magazine pieces, Mrs Speart says, she worked closely with

real life US Fish & Wildlife agents and came to fully respect the jobs they

do.

"I really learned how wildlife in our own country is being pummeled," Mrs

Speart said. "Illegal wildlife smuggling is a $5 billion business every year

in this country. It's second only to drug smuggling, yet people have no idea

how much this goes on."

Mrs Speart describes Agent Rachel Porter as "a really strong, feisty female."

A failed actress, Porter decides to take on the challenge of life as a US Fish

& Wildlife Agent. In Gator Aide , the agent is sent to the French Quarter of

New Orleans, where a dead alligator has been found chained to a bathtub.

When Porter discovers that it was an over-dose of ingested heroin-filled

condoms that killed the gator, and not the five bullet holes to the animal's

head, the agent's career is afoot.

The following year, in Tortoise Soup , Agent Porter is transferred to Nevada

after 350 endangered tortoises disappear from a federal hatching site.

Bird Brained is the newest Rachel Porter book. This one takes the agent into

Miami, where she encounters illegal parrots and tangles with suspects that run

the gamut from a snake dealer and Cuban cigar smugglers to airboat cowboys and

anti-Castro terrorists.

Mrs Speart is already at work on her fourth book. Her first contract with Avon

has been fulfilled, and a second one calls for another two books. After that,

Rachel Porter books will move into the hardcover publishing sector.

"The whole idea with publishing mysteries these days is to build a readership,

which is why you are first published in original paperback," Mrs Speart

explained. "And then once the readership is there, you flip over to hardcover.

"

Agents who have read Mrs Speart's books have been enthusiastic with their

response. "They feel it brings attention to the plight of the animals, and

also the struggle facing the agents. I mean, how many people even know there

are Fish & Wildlife agents out there?

"I also thought it was important to let people know this is really going on in

this country," the author continued. "We hear so much about Africa, and

elephants, for instance, but our own wildlife is being battered. And that

hasn't come to the forefront.

"I wanted to reach an audience that might wonder whether this stuff was really

going on, because it is. This is done in a very entertaining form, and at the

same time it's educating people about problems that exist within our own

country."

Mapson On May 26

Having just had her fifth novel, The Wilder Sisters , released by

HarperCollins, Jo-Ann Mapson says writing is both easier and just as hard as

it ever has been. The author will be at the Book Review on Wednesday, May 26,

at 7 pm.

"In some ways, I pretty much know the drill. I know what's going to happen --

the plot, what's going to happen to the characters -- and that part is easy,"

Ms Mapson said last week from her home in southern California. "But as far as

actually writing the story, entering the emotional world of these characters,

no, it isn't any easier. It's always the same, difficult process."

With The Wilder Sisters (HarperFlamingo/HarperCollins Publishers , on-sale

date May 16; 364 pgs, $24 hardcover), Ms Mapson introduces Lily and Rose

Wilder, sisters who are polar opposites except when it comes to matters of the

heart. Both Wilder girls seem to always fall for individualistic, stubborn and

handsome men, resulting in a lifetime of broken hearts.

Rose's unfaithful husband is killed by a drunk driver, leaving a grieving

widow whose children have grown up and moved away from home. Younger sister

Lily is a career woman who goes through numerous unfulfilling relationships.

When each sister decides she misses her parents' ranch in New Mexico, neither

realizes the other has made the same decision. Once each arrives at the ranch,

even though they have not spoken for over five years and a reconciliation is

the last thing on each sister's mind, neither Lily nor Rose is willing to

leave the ranch.

The Wilder Sisters is a touching epic that follows one year of the sisters'

lives while at their parents' ranch.

"This one came out of me pretty quickly," the author said. "There was a lot of

stuff here I really wanted to talk about... sisters and difficult men, family.

I really enjoyed writing it."

The author is on a book tour this month and next, which will take her across

the country. Her visit in Newtown will be entertaining not only for those who

enjoy the relationships she writes so well about, but also for readers who

enjoy westerns and horse-themed books.

Ms Mapson's family is involved in the horse industry, with her older brother a

rider in the show jump circuit and her younger sister a western rider. Both

siblings, says Ms Mapson, enjoy her books, as does her mother. "She likes it

when I don't cuss," she laughed.

"I think horses are in my blood from my mother's family," she continued. "My

sisters and I were enamored of horses when we were young, but we didn't have

horses or lessons." The author took up riding when she was in her 20s, and got

her first horse around age 30.