Pintsized Pioneers At Play: Book Campaign a

 PINTSIZED PIONEERS AT PLAY:

Homemade Frontier Fun and Danger

By Preston Lewis & Harriet Kocher Lewis

Young Adult / Nonfiction / History

Publisher: Bariso Press

Pages: 218

Publication Date: 4 November 2025

SYNOPSIS

Discover the Wild Side of Frontier Childhood!

Pintsized Pioneers at Play: Homemade Frontier Fun and Danger explores the forgotten world of how kids lived, laughed-and sometimes limped-through their childhood years in the Old West.

While their parents settled the land, these pintsized pioneers explored it, creating their own adventures with homemade toys, daring games, wild animal encounters, and risky escapades. This engaging sequel to the award-winning Pintsized Pioneers: Taming the Frontier, One Chore at a Time shines a spotlight on the joys and perils of play in a land still being tamed.

From exploring the prairie and wrangling critters to celebrating frontier holidays and watching traveling circuses, this book reveals how children carved out fun and entertainment in a rough-and-tumble world. Learn how railroads and mail-order catalogs brought new toys, how schools and churches doubled as social hubs, and how a simple game could end in laughter-or injury.

Written for young adults but fascinating for readers of all ages, Pintsized Pioneers at Play is packed with history, heart, and a hint of danger. Written at a tenth-grade reading level perfect for curious minds, Pintsized Pioneers at Play includes a glossary of related terms.

Perfect for fans of Western history, educators, homeschoolers, and lovers of untold American stories!

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ABOUT THE AUTHORS

Preston Lewis and Harriet Kocher Lewis co-authored three books in the "Magic Machine Series" published by Bariso Press:  Devotionals from a Soulless Machine, Jokes from a Humorless Machine, and Recipes from a Tasteless Machine. They reside in San Angelo, Texas.

Preston Lewis has published more than 50 fiction and nonfiction works.  The author and historian’s books include traditional Westerns, historical novels, comic Westerns, young adult books, and historical accounts.  In 2021 he was inducted into the Texas Institute of Letters for his literary accomplishments. 

His writing honors include two Spur Awards from Western Writers of America and three Elmer Kelton Awards from the West Texas Historical Association.  He has received ten Will Rogers Medallion Awards, and in 2024, he earned an inaugural Literary Global Independent Author Award in the Western Nonfiction category for Cat Tales of the Old West.   

He is a past president of Western Writers of America and the West Texas Historical Association, which named him a fellow in 2016.  

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Harriet Kocher Lewis is the award-winning editor and publisher of Bariso Press. Titles she has edited have been honored with Will Rogers Medallion Awards, Spur Finalist designations, and Independent Author Awards.  

Lewis concluded her 26-year physical therapy career as the inaugural clinical coordinator for the physical therapy program at Angelo State University, where she taught technical writing and wrote or edited numerous scientific papers as well as a chapter in a clinical education textbook.  

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Parade of Secrets: Book Campaign and Giveaway

 

PARADE OF SECRETS

A Lane Hayes Mystery

By Kimberly Fish

Historical Mystery / Female Sleuth

Publisher: Fish Tales Publishing

Publication Date: October 31, 2025

Pages: 341

SYNOPSIS

Layers of history, suspense, and emotion.

March, 1948. Lane Mercer Hayes, and her husband, Zeke, have that post-war life that everyone envies. His winning record as a prosecutor and a scratch golfer, teamed with her finesse in a bookshop puts them on the list of up and coming leaders in Longview, Texas. That is, until Lane is exposed by Senate candidate, Lyndon B. Johnson, for the clandestine role she plays in a Black-owned security agency. Forced to face the cracks in her marriage and the boredom in her life, she can no longer be that “teacup of whiskey” that former Big Inch pipeline associates nicknamed her. Though newspaper headlines tout prosperity and development, Lane can’t get past the emptiness in her soul after the adrenaline rush of working for the Office of Strategic Services during the war.

Longview, Texas, is changing—from LeTourneau Incorporated bringing big manufacturing to the construction of Lake Cherokee and even the massively celebrated Gregg County Diamond Jubilee and the return of the popular Founder’s Day parade. So when an unexpected interview with R.G. LeTourneau appears to give Lane the opportunity to dust off her former OSS skills; she grabs it. To end the vandalism turmoil for LeTourneau, Lane steps out as a private investigator and encounters more than one death befalling families with secrets to hide.

With the clock ticking, Lane grows increasingly unconvinced she has the know-how to discover the truth or make peace with the sheriff who questions her every step. Time and pressure work against her in unraveling the mystery and restoring the good name of those who learned too late that they were innocent. Thankfully, in the course of the investigation, she discovers an unlikely ensemble of residents she can rely on, even when the future looks grim.

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ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Kimberly Fish has been in the writing industry for over 30 years. An amateur historian and fan of cozy mysteries, she weaves history and mystery into her stories of women finding their grit and sweet second chances.

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Pillars of Creation: Book Campaign and Giveaway

                                                     

  Pillars of Creation

A Quest for the Great Name in a Nietzschean World

By Carlos Nicolás Flores

Literary Fiction, Coming of Age

Publisher: Atmosphere Press

Publication Date: 22 July, 2025

SYNOPSIS

Where is God amidst the mass graves, poverty, drug trafficking, and corrupt officials on the Texas-Mexico border?

Yoltic Cortez, a college dropout and aspiring writer in his mid-twenties, grapples with this question while living in an impoverished colonia. His bedridden father warns him to prepare spiritually for the challenges ahead by returning to their religious traditions and confronting the "Devil in the desert."

Encouraged by his mentor, the "Failed Poet," to pursue a literary career, Yoltic struggles to write his first book. His situation is further complicated when a young Mexican woman, fleeing the violence in northern Mexico, seeks his help.

In this Nietzschean world, a secular realm fraught with fear and loathing, where God has been declared dead, Yoltic's quest for redemption and wisdom unfolds. Pillars of Creation: A Quest for the Great Name in a Nietzschean World by Carlos Nicolás Flores offers a powerful perspective on the crisis at the Mexican-American border through the eyes of a gifted young Tejano.

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ABOUT THE AUTHOR

A lifelong resident of the Texas-Mexico border, Carlos Nicolás Flores has much lived experience to draw from as a novelist. In Our House on Hueco, he portrays an impoverished family’s struggle to achieve the American dream. “This book feels like a classic to me,” states Naomi Shahib Nye. In Sex as a Political Condition, a satire of the cultural wars on the border, he reflects on the male condition at the end of the Cold War. In Pillars of Creation: A Quest for the Great Name in a Nietzschean (Atmosphere Press 2025), he portrays a young Chicano’s search for meaning in a world torn apart by violence on the Texas-Mexico border. According to Lily Andrews of Feather Quill Reviews, Flores “ably captures what it means to be stuck between cultures by showing how being Chicano isn’t just about language or heritage, but a constant tug-of-war between belonging and not.”

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Hummingibird Moonrise: Book Campaign and Giveaway

 

HUMMINGBIRD MOONRISE

By Sherri L. Dodd

Paranormal Thriller / Fantasy / Magical Realism / Witch-Lit

Publisher: Black Rose Writing

Pages: 304

Publication Date: October 9, 2025

SYNOPSIS

The past two years have taken their toll on Arista Kelly. Once an eternal optimist, now she has faced the darkness and must recalibrate what true happiness means for her. Meanwhile, Shane, her ex-boyfriend, is pulling all the right moves to help keep her sane from her heightening paranoia. But it doesn't help that Iris, her Great Aunt Bethie's friend, has disappeared.

Still, one additional trial remains. While searching for Iris, Bethie and Arista stumble upon a grand revelation in the eccentric woman's home. With the discovery, they realize their run of chaos and loss of kin may have roots in a curse that dates back to the 1940s-the time when their family patriarch first built Arista's cottage in the redwoods and crafted his insightful Ouija table.

This pursuit will not follow their accustomed recipe of adrenalized action, but the high stakes remain. Will the mysterious slow burn of unfolding events finally level Arista's entire world or be fully extinguished, once and for all?

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ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Sherri L. Dodd was raised in southeast Texas. Walking barefoot most days and catching crawdads as they swam the creek beds, she had a love for all things free and natural. Her childhood ran rampant with talk of ghosts, demons, and backcountry folklore. This inspired her first story for sale, about a poisonous flower that shot toxins onto children as they smelled it. Her classmate bought it for all the change in his pocket. Shortly thereafter, her mother packed the two of them up and headed to the central coast of California. Since that time, she has worked corporate, married, raised two sons, and now writes full-time creating atmospheric paranormal fiction. Her debut novel – Murder Under Redwood Moon – shot straight to #1 on Amazon, holding firm as a Best Seller in the Occult Supernatural genre.

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