Looking for a good read this summer? Check out some local authors for fiction, nonfiction and even children’s books. Then find your favorite spot – a deck chair, hammock or in the sand at the coast – and dig into a good book.

David Hilton 

Kyle resident and author David Hilton grew up in West Texas, a place he considers inspiration for many of his stories. 

In Alpine, he was a boy scout, backpacked throughout Big Bend National Park, and has even seen a Marfa Ghost Light at close range.

With his bachelor’s degree from Howard Payne University, Hilton began writing short stories. Kings of Colorado is his first novel, and was selected as a Barnes & Noble Discover Great New Writers pick. 

Set in the Colorado mountains, the book shares a tale of four teenage boys at a reformatory ranch. The main character, William Sheppard, is there for stabbing his abusive father. 

With a backbone of heart-wrenching suspense, Kings of Colorado portrays brotherhood set against the nobility, danger, and wildness of youth and horses. The boys learn to rely on each other and work together while struggling to survive a world of hurt and cruelty. The story illustrates how easily innocence can be stripped away, robbing us of something most precious: childhood.

Kings of Colorado is available on Amazon.com.

Terri Clamons 

When Terri Clamons’ writing career started, it had very little to do with books. She focused on print media, creative writing and social studies programs for elementary schools, radio public service announcements, producing and hosting a weekly cable television children’s program, and ownership of Kansas City Parent Magazine. 

An English and History major, Clamons’ earned her B.A. She wrote her first book, “Wellfamilies Handbook” in 1990, published by Westport Publishers, Kansas City, MO. She is working on updating that book. A new edition will be available at Amazon in both paperback and Kindle format.

Since that time, Clamons tried her hand at mainstream adult fiction. The result was “Corporate Prince”, a story of adventure and suspense. She transitioned to suspense and mystery with “The Toy Room” and “Cocaine Campus”.  A sequel to “The Toy Room” is now in progress. 

In 2012, Terri introduced three books for young children: “The Church Mouse That Flew”, “Jenny and the Backyard Zoo” and “Crosswise Charlie”. The books deal with issues such as facing bullies and being a good friend.   

Clamons “re-charges her batteries” at writers’ conferences and webinars, and weekly shared times with good friends and writing mentors known as “The Write Girls.”

All of Clamons’ books are available at Amazon in paperback and Kindle format.

Heather Anastasiu

Heather Anastasiu, author of a young adult sci-fi trilogy, Glitch (St. Martin’s Press), grew up in Texas. She graduated from Hays High School in 1986.

And even back then, she was reading and watching every dystopian book and movie out there - Gattaca, Terminator, Total Recall, Logan’s Run. The genre, basically stories about an imaginary place where people lead dehumanized and often fearful lives, thrilled her.

So the leap to writing her own series of science fiction books was no surprise.

The idea sparked when her husband mentioned a Popular Science article about scientists researching the possibility of implanting something akin to memory chips for Alzheimer’s patients. Anastasiu said she was instantly creeped out but intrigued.

“I started wondering what other bits of technology we might start implanting in our bodies in the future, and how people in power might use it as a means of control,” she said.

Her advice for aspiring writers is to write. 

“Write regularly and get into the habit of it,” she said.

Anastasiu also advised writers to listen to critique and be willing to incorporate it, even if it means big changes and rewrites.

“It takes a lot of time to learn how to write scenes, natural dialogue, and a compelling plot,” she said.

The series is available on Amazon.com.

Tom Grimes

Tom Grimes is the author of several novels and “Mentor: A Memoir”. The book traces his long friendship with Frank Conroy, former director of the Iowa Writers Workshop. The two meet during a chance encounter between two writers that developed into a friendship neither expected.  Their lives become entwined, and through both successes and disappointments, their bond deepens. 

Mentor was a finalist for the 2010 PEN USA Award for Creative Nonfiction and named a Best Nonfiction Book of 2010 by The Washington Post and Kirkus Reviews. Barnes & Noble selected the book for its 2010 “Discover Great Writers Series.”  Grimes directs the MFA Program in Creative Writing at Texas State University.

Mentor is available on Amazon.com.

Susan Bahr

Before taking off for Saudi Arabia in 1992, Susan Bahr asked her father, the family storyteller, to write down all his stories. Over the next 17 years, she and her husband raised a family in the Middle East while working for Aranco Oil Company in their school. She was a music teacher, her husband a central office curriculum coordinator. During that time, her father sent her manila envelopes periodically. Inside each was another story from his life in Colorado, where Bahr also grew up. Her father got other family members involved in the endeavor. Bahr put all of those pages in a three-ring binder. But knowing her family would never read that, she decided to compile those stories into a book. She also spent hours scanning old family photos. The result is a collection of tales called “Fireside Stories”. Bahr also plans to put together a second book of family letters.

Fireside Stories is available on Google Books.

Celeste Messer

Celeste Messer got to Kyle by way of the mid-West, Venuzuela and Dallas. Maybe not the most typical route, but along the way, she discovered the material for her first book, “Imperfect Rose”.

This fiction novel is just under 300 pages of what Messer called light reading.

“It’s about a mother and her four daughters,” she said. “How you can grow up in the same family but the personalities are so different.”

Messer said the characters, who resemble her and her four grown daughters in some ways, come together in a crisis and learn to work together. Their names in the book are Daisy, Rose, Lily and Violet.

It was intended as a one-time deal, but Messer said she decided to make it a series, with each one shining a spotlight on a different daughter. The series, Patrick’s Garden, will pull elements from Messer’s life. She is about halfway through the second book, “Daisy’s New Dawn”.

Speaking about “Imperfect Rose”, she said she didn’t realize how much it was parallel to her own life. 

“People that know me can see those things,” Messer said, who was a corporate executive for GTE for most of her career.

Through her writing, Messer said she learned more about herself.

“Walls come down,” she said. “Writing helps me understand what I’m feeling.”

Messer said for many writers, it’s often it’s about the process, not necessarily the outcome.  

“Each book or piece of music or art is a little bit of its creator himself or herself,” she said. “That’s why I find the process of writing so fascinating. I always say it’s magic.”

“Imperfect Rose” is available on Kindle. A paperback release is slated for August. Messer also has a series of children’s books, called “The Adventures of Andie O’Malley”, available on Amazon.

Michael Fry

Michael Fry has been a cartoonist/writer/entrepreneur for more than 30 years. In addition to The Odd Squad middle grade series of illustrated novels for Disney/Hyperion, Fry has created or co/created four international syndicated comic strips including Over the Hedge, which runs in newspapers worldwide.  Over the Hedge, nominated for Best Comic Strip in 2006 by the National Cartoonist Society Rueben Awards, inspired the hit DreamWorks Animation feature animated film that grossed over $336 million dollars in worldwide box office. His latest book, “Bully Bait,” is the first of the Odd Squad series. In it, Fry brings to life Nick, the shortest seventh-grader in the history of the world. He doesn’t fit in with any groups or clubs and spends more time inside than outside his locker (they’re roomier than you’d think). Things only get worse when a well-intentioned guidance counselor forces Nick to join the school’s lamest club – along with fellow misfits Molly and Karl – in her quest to cure all three of their “peer allergies.” What starts off as a reluctant band of hopeless oddballs morphs into a formidable team ready to face whatever middle school throws at them, including bullies, awkward romance, zany adults, and a brave new world of surprising friendships. “Zero Tolerance,” book 2 in the series, will hit shelves this September. “Bully Bait” is available on Amazon.com.

Other Hays County authors:

Jen Hatmaker, “7 : An Experimental Mutiny Against Excess” – the true story of how Jen took seven months, identified seven areas of excess, and made seven simple choices to fight back against the modern-day diseases of greed, materialism, and overindulgence.

Lori Rolie, “Meem’s Little World” – a collection of nine short stories based on Rolie’s poems, all illustrated by Rolie. The bonus: each story holds a little mouse hidden within the pictures.