More than 40 authors turned out Saturday at the second New Mexico Book Fiesta — a monthly fair described as a farmers market for writers to sell their works directly to the public.

"One of the major problems of the book industry is not Amazon and it's not the big publishers — it's that the public just isn't reading," explained Harmon Houghton of Clear Light Publishers, which co-sponsors the book fair on the third Saturday of each month next to its retail shop at 851 San Mateo Road.

"What we're doing is trying to get the readers and the authors to meet, exchange books, exchange stories and share the talent that we have," he continued. "It's our own economic stimulus right here."

Houghton, a native of Greece, and Marcia Keegan, who grew up in Albuquerque, met in New York City where he was running a computer firm and she was working as a photographer. In 1981, they formed Clear Light to publish the Dalai Lama's first book, Ocean of Wisdom.

In 1988, they brought their publishing firm to Santa Fe, where they focused on American Indians and branched out into other topics about the Southwest from their home on Don Diego Avenue. For years, they ran a retail outlet at the Santa Fe Place mall. But in November, they reopened the shop in the space formerly occupied by Form & Function.

After the Open Hands thrift store vacated its space next door to the book shop, Houghton and Keegan, along with Paul Rhetts, publisher and managing editor of LPD Press in Albuquerque, struck a deal with the property owner to use the space for the monthly book fair.

Among the local celebrity authors at Saturday's book fair was Victor di Suvero, whose latest book, We Came to Santa Fe, tells the stories of 73 locals, including actress Ali McGraw, Cultural Affairs Secretary Stuart Ashman, THE magazine publisher Guy Cross and singer Consuelo Luz.

The oldest participant Saturday was Howard Bryan, 88, who worked as a reporter and columnist for the now-defunct Albuquerque Tribune before turning to writing history books. His latest, published by Clear Light, are Wildest of the Wild West and The Incredible Elfego Baca.

Other fair participants with books published by Clear Light included Hal Simmons, another former Tribune writer; Joe Sando, a Jemez Pueblo native who specializes in Pueblo Indian subjects; Taos Pueblo artist Jonathan Warm Day, who has written a children's book of tales featuring his paintings; and Bonnie Larson, who has written a book of Huichol Indian tales from Mexico.

Most of the fair's authors published themselves or used other publishers. Kenneth Briden, a Texas native who taught school in California and now lives in Albuquerque, brought copies of two books of his fictional trilogy called In Search of Freedom, about a German immigrant to Texas in the mid-1840s. He said the final novel is now being printed.

Saturday's book fair included some strange bedfellows — ranging from Jim Thompson's The Physics of Genesis, described as "a traditional interpretation of Genesis blended with quantum physics, information theory and chaos theory," and Robert Blanc's The Birth Pangs, a discussion of biblical prophecy on "apostasy, false teachers and false prophets, and world events in the end times."

Ruth Drayer, who recently moved to Santa Fe from Las Cruces, was selling her book, Nicholas and Helena Roerich: The Spiritual Journey of Two Great Artists and Peacemakers, about an artistic couple who lived briefly in Santa Fe in the 1920s before heading to India. Although the Roeriches are little-known today, Drayer said, they helped influence Santa Fe's original artistic enclave, Los Cinco Pintores.

Contact Tom Sharpe at 986-3080 or tsharpe@sfnewmexican.com.