“The ache for home lives in all of us, the safe place where we can go as we are and not be questioned.” ~ Maya Angelou
SHORT BIO:
Kathleen M. Rodgers is a novelist and a former contributor to Family Circle Magazine and Military Times. Her fifth novel, The Llano County Mermaid Club, is slated for release September 16, 2025 by University of New Mexico Press and is represented by Tracy Crow Literary Agency. A native of Clovis, New Mexico, Kathleen resides in North Texas and is working on her sixth novel. She is available to speak at book clubs and other events.
More info:
Jonathan Haupt, Executive Director of The Pat Conroy Literary Center, interviewed the author about her fourth novel, The Flying Cutterbucks, for Authors on the Air Global Radio Network. The audiobook released 2021 from Skyboat Media/Blackstone Publishing and is narrated by F Michelle Williams. Michelle and Kathleen were interviewed by nationally syndicated radio host Ed Kalegi on The Weekend With Ed Kalegi.
Seven Wings to Glory, Rodgers’ third novel, won the 2020 MWSA Founder's Award. In 2017, it won an Honorable Mention for War & Military in the Foreword Indies Book of the Year Awards and was reviewed in Southern Literary Review and internationally in Stars & Stripes.
Her second novel, Johnnie Come Lately, was featured on "The Author's Corner" on Public Radio." The audio edition is narrated by Grammy® Award-winning vocalist and Broadway actress Leslie Ellis. Thorndike Press, a leading large print publisher in the United States, released Johnnie Come Lately and Seven Wings to Glory in hardcover large print editions in early 2018.
The Final Salute, her debut novel, released in 2008 and was featured in USA Today, The Associated Press, and Military Times.
Anthology collections include those published by McGraw-Hill, University of Nebraska Press/Potomac Books, Health Communications, Inc., AMG Publishers, Press 53, and Bedazzled Ink.
In 2014, Rodgers was named a Distinguished Alumna from Tarrant County College/NE Campus. In 2017, the Clovis Municipal School Foundation in Clovis, NM awarded her the Purple Pride Hall of Honor Award under the "Sports and Entertainment" category. Three of her aviation poems from the book Because I Fly (McGraw-Hill) were featured in an exhibit at the Cradle of Aviation Museum on Long Island, NY.
Kathleen and her husband, Tom, a retired USAF fighter pilot/commercial airline pilot, raised two sons and enjoy spending time with their grandsons. They have raised three dogs and said goodbye to two of them. Scroll down to see their photos.
"Nevertheless, She Persisted!"
In Conversation with Award-Winning Host Julia Brewer Daily on AUTHORS OVER 50.
Theresa Bakken, audiobook narrator and host of Desideratum Podcast, chats with Kathleen and voice talent F. Michelle Williams.
Jav and I are missing our sweet Denton who left us in early February of 2025. Thanks to my hubby, Tom, for taking the photo.
Our lovable rascal. In the moment before Denton's spirit left his body, I reminded him, "You're the one Bubba sent."
Bubba helped me through empty-nest syndrome. Five months after he died, he sent me Denton the wonder dog.