Books

CAITLIN ROTHER


Lost Girls, the story behind the rape and murder of San Diego area teenagers Amber Dubois and Chelsea King by sexual predator John Gardner, who grew from a caring, troubled boy into a man who could not stop his violent compulsions. (Kensington, July 2012).


Poisoned Love, the true story of Kristin Rossum, an attractive and talented toxicologist convicted of poisoning her husband with drugs she stole from her lab at the San Diego County Medical Examiner’s Office. Rossum, who was having an affair with her married boss, staged a suicide scene by sprinkling red rose petals over her husband's body. (Updated edition with 16 new pages released in December 2011).

My Life, Deleted, a memoir of recovery and resillience: former NFL player and aviation entrepreneur Scott Bolzan recovers from a brain injury that cost him his entire long-term memory (HarperOne, October 2011)

Dead Reckoning, the story of how Skylar Deleon, a child actor turned conman and hermaphrodite-wannabe, schemed with his wife Jennifer to murder a married couple, who were tied to the anchor of their yacht and thrown overboard – alive -- by Skylar and his clan of outlaws near Newport Beach, California. (February 1, 2011.)

Twisted Triangle: A Famous Crime Writer, a Lesbian Love Affair, and the FBI Husband’s Violent Revenge, the crazy but factual account of a kidnapping, an attempted murder and a love triangle involving two married FBI agents, Margo and Gene Bennett, and crime novelist Patricia Cornwell.(Wiley/Jossey-Bass, 2008)

Body Parts takes a deep psychological look at the life of serial killer Wayne Adam Ford, a long-haul trucker who was convicted of killing four women, dismembering two of them, and then doing the rare deed of turning himself in to keep from killing again. (Kensington/Pinnacle, 2009)

Where Hope Begins/Deadly Devotion, the story of TV reporter Alysia Sofios helping the survivors of the Marcus Wesson family recover from a cult-like life of polygamy, abuse, molestation and incest -- and the mass murder of nine of their own children.


Naked Addiction, a fictional tale of sex, drugs and murder at the beach. Police detective Ken Goode deals with his own demons as he investigates the murder of a series of young beauty school students in La Jolla and Pacific Beach. (Dorchester, January 2007)

Caitlin is about to market her second novel, and is working on a book titled, I'll Take Care of You, about the murder of multimillionaire Bill McLaughlin by his fiancee Nanette Johnston Packard and her NFL-linebacker lover Eric Naposki novel, and another non-fiction project TBA soon.


KATHI DIAMANT

Kafka’s Last Love: The Mystery of Dora Diamant (Basic Books, 2003) is a literary detective story and biography about the mysterious young Eastern European woman who lived with Franz Kafka in the last year of his life. Based on two decades of critically acclaimed research, it has also been published in the UK, Spain, France, Russia and is coming soon in Chinese and Portuguese (Brazil) translations. Kafka’s Last Love won the Theodore Geisel Award, the "Best of the Best" in the 2004 San Diego Book Awards.

Work in progress: 108 Coincidences: Lessons in Getting Kafka chronicles the miraculous and eerie coincidences that led to the search for Kafka’s last love, and the discoveries of Dora’s diary, letters and ultimately, living family members. It also describes the discoveries of three original Kafka letters, and the ongoing coincidences on the continuing international search for a literary treasure, Kafka’s lost notebooks and letters.


LAUREL CORONA

The Four Seasons: A Novel Of Vivaldi’s Venice (Hyperion/Voice 2008) won the 2009 Theodor Geisel Award for Book of the Year from the San Diego Book Awards and has been translated into eleven foreign languages.

Until Our Last Breath: A Holocaust Story Of Love And Partisan Resistance (St. Martin’s Press 2008) is a non-fiction work about the Jewish resistance movement in Vilna, Lithuania. It won a San Diego Book Award as well as a Christopher Medal, a national award given to books whose writers “craft words and images into a clear, cohesive vision” and “affirm the highest values of the human spirit.”

Corona’s second novel, Penelope’s Daughter (Penguin/Berkley 2010) tells the story of Homer’s Odyssey from the perspective of a daughter born to Odysseus after he leaves for Troy.

Her third novel, Finding Emilie (Simon and Schuster/Gallery 2011) is based on the life story of Emilie du Chatelet, the brilliant eighteenth-century physicist and mathematician who was also Voltaire’s lover and muse.

She is working on her fourth novel, Shape of the World, set in Spain at the time of Ferdinand and Isabella.


GEORGEANNE "GEORGE" IRVINE

The Katrina Dolphins: One-Way Ticket to Paradise (Paradise Cay Publishing): This saga of hope and herosim is a real-life adventure coffee table book that features the true tale of eight dolphins from Gulfport, Mississippi's Marine Life Oceanarium, who were swept out to sea when Hurricane Katrina roared ashore on August 29, 2007. They miraculously stayed together in a polluted ocean filled with debris and were dramatically brought to safety via a massive rescue effort.

The True Story of Corky the Blind Seal (Scholastic, Inc.): Corky, a performing seal superstar at the San Diego Zoo, overcomes the challenges of cataract-caused blindness through courage, determination, and the devotion of his compassionate trainers.

Blanca and Arusha: Tales of Two Big Cats (Simon and Schuster): This book features the extraordinary stories of Blanca, a white tiger cub seized from smuggles at the U.S./Mexican border, and Arusha, a cheetah animal ambassador who has an unusual best friend: Anna, a golden retriever.

Raising Gordy Gorilla at the San Diego Zoo (Simon and Schuster): Gordy, a prematurely born gorilla, needs special nursery care to ensure his survival. His adorable antics charm his keepers as he develops into a healthy, charismatic young gorilla, and travels by limo to the Zoo’s Wild Animal Park, where he learns to live with a troop of gorillas.

The Visit of Two Giant Pandas at the San Diego Zoo (Simon and Schuster): For the first time ever, giant pandas from China travel to the San Diego Zoo to help Americans learn about the plight of these endearing black-and-white bears.

She is now working on Hope for Amizero, with illustrations by Marc Nadel: When an orphaned infant chimpanzee is rescued from poachers and brought to Jane Goodall's chimpanzee care center in Burundi, Central Africa, her chances of survival are slim. Against all odds, the baby - named Amizero for "hope" in the local language -survives and becomes the friendliest, most mischievous chimpanzee at the orphanage, but life there changes when civil war erupts in the tiny African nation.


DINIVA INFUSINO

In Day Trips (Globe Pequot, June 2010),Divina explores the magnetic appeal of 30 well and little known SoCal destinations from Palm Springs to Coronado, while providing practical information and a range of choices on what to do, where to stay, dine, shop, hike, beautify, romance and relax.

The Love Response, a mind-body-spirit book with Harvard integrated medical practitioner, Dr. Eva Selhub. (Ballantine/Random House, 2009.)

Divina wrote the essays and stories for the rock music photography book, Rock Gods by Robert Knight (Insight Editions/Random House, November, 2008).


JUDITH LIU

Foreign Exchange: Counterculture behind the Walls of St. Hilda’s School for Girls 1929-1937 tells three tales of an American Episcopalian missionary school in central China. The first is about Judith’s mother, Yeh Yuanshuang, who attended the school from 1929-1935; the second is about an American teacher, Dorothea Kingsley Wakeman, who went to the school to teach English during the Depression; and the third is a history of St. Hilda’s School for Girls.

The Ethnographic Eye: Interpretative Studies of Education in China, co-edited.


ZOREH GHAHREMANI

Sky of Red Poppies (Turquoise, July 2010), her English-language novel, which is short listed for an award in this year's KPBS’s “One Book, One San Diego” contest.

The Commiserator, which is in her native language of Persian.


MARJORIE HART

Summer at Tiffany, the New York Times bestselling story of Marjorie Jacobson and her best friend, Martha Garrett, who were the first women to ever work the sales floor at Tiffany & Co. after arriving in the summer of 1945. Fresh from the University of Iowa at the close of WWII, Marjorie fell in love, learned unforgettable lessons, made important decisions that would change her future and created the remarkable memories she shares with us all. (William Morrow/Harper Collins, 2007).


MARGARET DILLOWAY

How To Be an American Housewife (Putnam Books/Berkley Books) is the story of a Japanese war bride and her American daughter. When Shoko wants to make one last trip back to Japan to reconcile with her estranged brother, she finds she's too sick to go, so she sends her daughter Sue and granddaughter Helena in her place. The journey ends up changing all of their lives in unexpected ways.

Coming soon: The Care and Handling of Roses With Thorns (Putnam Books, Spring 2012) is about 36-year-old Gal Garner, who lives a regimented life, toggling between her teaching job, dialysis for her failed kidney, and her rose garden, where's she's close to perfecting a new breed of rose. Then one afternoon Gal’s niece Riley, the daughter of her estranged sister, arrives. Unannounced. And their lives will never be the same…


Margaret is working on her third novel.