In Belle’s Star, Darcy, a spunky soccer playing girl, and her Aunt Ellen rescue Belle from abusive owners and offer her love. Belle has never met a kind human. Living with Darcy terrifies her. Other people and animals, including a cat, teach her about trust.  

 

     Written from Belle’s point of view and illustrated by Farmington artist, John Cogan, Belle's Star and Belle’s Trial encourage kids to treat animals and each other with respect; empower children to make good choices when they face difficult situations, and encourage self discipline.

 

     In Belle’s Trial, Belle finds life as a pet boring when Darcy goes to school.  Looking for a challenge, Belle digs her way out of the yard, turns over waste baskets, and chews furniture.  Darcy’s Mom and Dad consider finding her a new home where someone can give her a job. Darcy provides employment that challenges Belle’s mind and body. However to do the work, Belle must learn self discipline.  Darcy must make a hard choice.  Both must cope with someone who has made their lives difficult.

 

     Award winning journalist and retired elementary school counselor Margaret Cheasebro has designed activities booklets for Belle's Star and Belle’s Trial. The booklets are available in downloadable form from apbooks.net  upon purchase of the novels.

 

     The guides can assist in classroom sessions designed to help elementary school students learn to interact with people and animals. Home schooling parents, who like to read and discuss stories with kids, can use the guides. Families and community groups can work on projects that foster strong community ties. Veterinarians, pet store owners, and animal shelter workers can use the guides to promote pet care.

 

     John Cogan has created black-and-white illustrations for each of the chapters in Belle’s Star and Belle’s Trial; and a color image for each book’s cover.  Known for his landscape acrylics still life, portraits, and wildlife images, he shows work at El Prado Galleries in Sedona, Arizona; Galleries West in Jackson, Wyoming; and Southwest Galleries in Dallas, Texas.

 

For dog loving grownups, Gotsch introduces her suspense thriller e-novel Snap Me a Future.

 

Re-released by Casa de Snapdragon after the original publisher went out of business, Snap Me A Future decries pot hunters who raid archaeological sites for artifacts.  Readers follow the adventures of Shelby McCoy, the once tough investigative reporter now working her way back into journalism after a horrific attack by the subject of one of her articles. While pursuing a story in New Mexico’s beautiful Four Corners, she comes face-to-face with a knife-wielding antiquities thief.  Can she and her black Setterdor, Sam, save both her life and the life of her lover, Benjamin Keith?

 

Snap Me a Future made MyShelf.com reviewer, Carolyn-Howard Johnson’s list of top 10 books for 2005.  Winner of eight awards for her novel This is the Place, . Ms. Howard-Johnson said, “when the reader turns the last page of Snap Me A Future, she walks away with a sense of place, (in this case the Four Corners area--)

 

Simgen.com reviewer, Jeanette Cotrell said, “the story has a good flow, attends to every detail of plot, and presents many insights into desert photography.”   Word Museum’s Laurie Binundo added, “I recommend this to anyone wo enjoys suspense.  It’s a story of how to prove what happened more than who done it.”  Kathy Cordova of the Silver City Press, Silver City New Mexico  commented, “as I read I easily pictured each character in my mind.  Gotsch described her book personalities so well that the casual reader easily identified with them.”

 

Snap Me a Future won Second Place for Full-Length Fiction in the New Mexico Press Women Communication Contest, 2005,