Fall is just around the corner, and a late-summer harvest of new books by Wyoming authors is already in the bag.

With cool autumn nights ahead in mind, check out these selections to enjoy with a cup of tea and a cozy blanket close at hand.

"Capital Characters of Old Cheyenne," by Lori Van Pelt (High Plains Press, $15.95)

The second in Lori Van Pelt's "Dreamers and Schemers" series, "Capital Characters…" contains 21 vivid biographies of some of Cheyenne's most colorful early residents. Van Pelt, of Saratoga, researched the lives of politicians, businessmen and cowgirls - from Barney Ford, a slave's son who owned Cheyenne's finest hotel, to Prairie Rose Henderson, a wild cowgirl who met a tragic and mysterious end.

"The Second Horseman," by Kyle Mills (St. Martin's Press, $24.95)

Kyle Mills' latest mystery, just released this month, is the story of Brandon Vale, a career thief who finds himself framed for a jewel heist he wasn't involved in. Richard Scanlon, the former FBI agent who set him up, atones for the deception by busting Vale out of prison, but then enlists Vale to help prevent the illegal sale of a dozen nuclear warheads. For Vale, it's either go back to prison and explain his escape, or join with Scanlon in the heist of his life. "The Second Horseman" is the eighth novel by Mills, of Jackson Hole, and promises to be a page-turner on the order of his last best-selling mystery, 2005's "Fade."

"Bears I Have Known: A Park Ranger's True Tales from Yellowstone and Glacier National Parks," by Bob Murphy (Riverbend Publishing, $10.95)

Former park ranger Bob Murphy penned this collection of short stories after years of service at Yellowstone and Glacier National Park. He retired from the park service in 1974, but his tales of bears and their interactions with humans are timeless. Tales of a teenage boy and a bear stuck up the same tree, a hungry grizzly who refused to leave a treat-filled cabin and an eerie hunt for one of Yellowstone's hugest bears could happen today as well as 60 years ago, when Murphy witnessed many of these events.

"It Wakes In Me," by Kathleen O'Neal Gear (Forge, $13.95)

The Black Falcon Nation returns in "It Wakes In Me," the second in a trilogy of Native-American dramas by Kathleen O'Neal Gear. From her buffalo ranch in the Owl Creek Mountains, Gear has spun the tale of Sora, the High Chieftess of prehistoric Florida's Black Falcon Nation. Sora stands wrongly accused of seven murders, but she can't defend herself because of the Midnight Fox - strange blackouts that have haunted her since childhood. She's sent to a healer, Strongheart, who tries to cure her of the mysterious "spirit illness" as she struggles to lead the Black Falcon Nation.

"Windwords of Wyoming: Brief Essays on Nature, Spirituality, Pets & People," by Kat LaFrance (MindfullSpoken Press, $19.95)

Former Casper resident Kat LaFrance, who now lives in Colorado, compiled this collection of her poems and essays about family, friends and life in the West.

"A Splendid Obsession," by Cathleen Galitz (Silhouette, $4.50)

Romance novels don't have to wait until next year's beach-blanket season. Cathleen Galitz's "A Splendid Obsession" is a romantic thriller set right here in the author's native Wyoming. In it, former supermodel Kayanne Aldarmann returns home to Wyoming after getting chewed up and spit out by her glamorous life in New York City. She meets a charming writer in her hometown of Sheridan, but he might not be as nice as he seems. Like the back of the book jacket says, "They both have secrets … but his are bigger."

"Four Wheels West: A Wyoming Number Book," By Eugene Gagliano and Illustrated by Susan Guy (Sleeping Bear Press, $17.95)

A counting book for big and little kids alike, "Four Wheels West," by Buffalo residents Eugene Gagliano and Susan Guy, takes readers on a journey across the Cowboy State. From "One is for polo field" to "100 bison in a herd," Gagliano introduces plenty of interesting facts about each subject, while Guy's paintings beautifully provide countable objects for youngsters.

Other fireside fall reads:

*"Powder River Poison" and "Pandemic Predator," by Maureen Meehan Aplin. PublishAmerica: In "Powder River Poison," Sheridan native Aplin puts attorney Mary MacIntosh on the case of a coal-bed methane gas company that's poisoning a Wyoming river basin. "Pandemic Predator," another Mary MacIntosh novel, follows the trail of a deadly strain of avian flu that made its way to a small northern Wyoming town.

*"The Man Who Carried A Drum: 108 War Letters and Love Letters of a Civil War Medic," by David Wesley Chapman. IUniverse, $20.95. Chapman, a Wyoming resident, explores the Civil War diary and letters of his great-grandfather, Harvey Amasa Chapman.

*"Evolution Toward Equality," by Teresa S. Neal. IUniverse, $15.95. Wyoming native Neal traces the second generation of daughters of the American West, when, she says, there was "a moment in western settlement when women achieved unparalleled equality and freedom."

*"Portrait of Yellowstone: Land of Geysers and Grizzlies," by David William Peterson. Farcountry Press, $24.95: The many moods of Yellowstone are captured by Peterson's lens in this collection of photographs.

Staff writer Kathleen St. John can be reached at 266-0586 or Kathleen.Stjohn@casperstartribune.net.