![\""Horse](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/04\/STP-L-BOOKS-0413_Winegar_cover.jpg\")
(Courtesy of the author)<\/p>\nSpring books by Minnestans are coming in fast. Here are three authors launching their fiction and nonfiction in post-Easter appearances.<\/p>\n
(Courtesy of the author)<\/p>\n
\u201cHorse Lovers: Unpacking the Female Fascination\u201d:<\/strong> by Karin Winegar (Horse Feed Press, $27.95)<\/p>\n Although I know about climate chaos and political apocalypse, and although I woke up feeling creaky and unloved, for now, I feel all is well\u2026 All is well as his unshod hooves crush the frozen, short-shorn alfalfa. All is well as we slip into the woods where deer flash among the birches, where woodpeckers dart and bob and a pair of eagles abide.\u00a0 All is well as we follow the side-by-side prints of a pair of coyotes in a rime of new snow. \u2026 Millions of other girls are born this way, and because it never stops, for a while, any while, in the company of horses, for us all is truly well. \u2014 from \u201cHorse Lovers\u201d<\/p>\n What is it about horses that keeps girls mucking out barns in dirty clothes, grown women spending money on saddles and equipment they sometimes can\u2019t afford?<\/p>\n After three decades of riding adventures, Karin Winegar tried to get answers to this puzzle as she rode with the top horsewomen in the United States and the United Kingdom. She rode and talked horses in Virginia horse country and in the American West. She talked to carriage drivers and women who did 100-mile endurance races.<\/p>\n Winegar, a former Star Tribune writer, has loved horses since her childhood in Albert Lea when she \u201crode\u201d her dad\u2019s back and rode bareback on her pony, Molly. She and other \u201chorse girls\u201d were a close community as they did stable work and cared for their horses. She even took her horse with her to Carleton College in Northfield.<\/p>\n \u201cWhat was the sensation I felt most often then?\u201d she writes of riding. \u201cAliveness.\u201d<\/p>\n When Winegar was earning her own money, she formed that horse-woman bond with Gabe, her gray Arabian \u201cheart horse.\u201d<\/p>\n Unlike some women, who ride only their own horse in the same place all the time, Winegar was willing to ride any mount she was given during her adventures. Closer to home, she drove carriages in downtown St. Paul, taking kids to proms and others for rides in cold weather.<\/p>\n One of the most elusive parts of Winegar\u2019s quest for information is how males differ from females when it comes to horses. She writes of seeing a change in men when she was about 16, as they looked at her in a different way. Is it that men want power over horses while women listen to the animal?<\/p>\n Written beautifully (as you\u2019d expect from an award-winning journalist), \u201cHorse Lovers\u201d includes chapters about horses in film and books, the heartbreak of losing your \u201cheart horse,\u201d women who give what money they can to stop the killing of wild horses and to rescue good horses sent to kill pens because nobody wants them. (This is a hard but important chapter to read.)<\/p>\n Among the horsewomen Winegar interviewed (often while riding together) are Pulitzer Prize winner Maxine Kumin; author and civil rights activist Rita Mae Brown; Minnesota Jungian analyst and psychologist Mary Lynn Kittelson; author and PBS documentary film maker Ginger Kathrens; and Carole Federighi, lawyer and endurance rider.<\/p>\n In the end, Winegar has no definitive answer to why there is a strong and fascinating bond between women and their horses. But a reader who is unfamiliar with the world of riding may simply say it is inherent love.<\/p>\n If you are a horse girl or even if you have never been near a Thoroughbred, you will enjoy this meditation on some women\u2019s passion written by someone who lives it.<\/p>\n Winegar, who has won awards for investigative and maritime writing, will launch her book at 7 p.m. April 23 at Magers & Quinn, 3038 Hennepin Ave. S.,\u00a0 Mpls., in conversation with fellow horse-lover Sarah T. Williams, former Star Tribune books editor. Free; registration at magersandquinn.com<\/a>.<\/p>\n \u201cThe Sun\u201d:<\/strong> by Frank Weber (Book Baby, $21)<\/p>\n When Melanie slipped off the edge, I immediately lunged and grabbed her around the shoulders. We fell past twelve feet and were still falling. We were going to die. \u2014 from \u201cThe Sun\u201d<\/p>\n Forensic psychologist Weber gives us a sort-of sequel to last year\u2019s \u201cScandal of Vandals\u201d in his new crime novel populated by am unsavory cast of characters except for Jon Frederick, an investigator for the Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Apprehension and profiler and his wife, Serena, a private investigator.<\/p>\n \u201cScandal for Vandals\u201d is based on the high-profile, real-life case of T. Eugene Thompson, a St. Paul man who went to prison for being behind the contract killing of his wife, Carol. In that book and the new one, the Thompson character is Tug Grant. Tug is in prison and his beautiful attorney and lover, Taytum Hanson, is working on getting him released.<\/p>\n Each chapter of \u201cThe Sun\u201d is told from a character\u2019s perspective, and there are so many that the author includes a helpful list of who and what they are. Mostly, they are either Mafia or gang members out to kill one another. There\u2019s Tug, who will do anything to become a millionaire again; convicted murderer Roan, married to Mafia boss Catania; Ricky, convicted killer who is trying to go straight; Melanie Pearson, who wants revenge; and the unnamed Assassin. It\u2019s not surprising there are dead bodies. It takes Jon and pregnant Serena to sort out this inter-connected web of criminals and what they are after.<\/p>\n Besides writing awards, Weber\u2019s professional honors include an Outstanding Achievement award from the MN Psychological Association and the President\u2019s Award from the MN Correctional Association for his forensic work. Weber and his wife, Brenda, are founders of CORE Professional Services, which helps offenders transition back into the community after incarceration.<\/p>\n Weber will be featured guest at Minnesota Mystery Night at 7 p.m. April 21 at Lucky\u2019s 13 Pub in Mendota. He will be in conversation with Minnesotan Betty Brandt Passick, author of three Gangster Series historical mysteries. Her most recent is \u201cThe Black Bag of Dr. Wiltse.\u201d<\/p>\n![\"Karin](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/04\/STP-L-BOOKS-0413_Winegar.jpg\")
Karin Winegar (Courtesy of the author)<\/p>\n![\""The](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/04\/STP-L-BOOKS-0413_Weber_cover.jpg\")
(Courtesy of the author)<\/p>\n![\"Frank](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/04\/STP-L-BOOKS-0413_Weber.jpg\")
Frank F. Weber (Courtesy of the author)<\/p>\n
![\""The](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/04\/STP-L-BOOKS-0413_Walz_cover.jpg\")
(Courtesy of the author)<\/p>\n![\"Jason](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/04\/STP-L-BOOKS-0413_Walz.jpg\")
Jason Walz (Courtesy of the author)<\/p>\n