Tough Trail Home is a thought-provoking work of women’s fiction. If you like deeply realized heroines, characters who grow and change, and ties that bind, then you’ll love Marie W. Watts’s captivating novel.

In seventy-two years, Grandma RiRi (AKA Marie W. Watts) has honed skills for life’s journey, perfecting them as a mother, grandmother, friend, wife, human resource manager, employment discrimination investigator, and mediator.

These tools for life contributed to the popularity of the textbook she co-authored, Human Relations 4ed., by Dalton, Hoyle, and Watts. First published in 1990, the book still garners worldwide sales. Additionally, these skills have been presented to adult learners in business settings.

Wanting her grandsons to have a jump start, Watts jotted down concepts that are at the heart of living well. In the spirit of giving back to the community, Watts is sharing her wisdom, not only to teens and young adults, but to anyone who is interested in self-improvement.

Short and to the point, the ideas presented can lead readers to explore the topics on their own.

Rapture By Revenge: Warriors for Equal Rights is the 2023 Gold Winner for Contemporary Realistic Fiction Human Relations Indie Book.

Praise for Rapture By Revenge:

"With a ripped from the headlines quality, Watt's offers an insider's peek into a complicated and controversial quest to right past wrongs in workplace conditions, as well as prevent new blocks to equality. Her characters are complex and never stereotyped and show readers the complexity and "ordinariness" of the problems. Because working for equality on all levels has never been a straight uphill climb, the characters themselves are buffeted about by the politics of the moment. I just became aware of the previous books in the series, but this book is a standalone, and the characters will hook you from page one.  Highly recommended for readers interested in contemporary novels about contemporary struggles."

Virginia McCullough, author of Amber Light

All Alice wants is to make it to retirement.  Her boss has other ideas.

As Alice’s team celebrates significant victories in bringing workplace discriminators to justice, their federal investigative unit is served a one-two punch.  The head of the agency, angry that Alice plunged the EEOC into a brutal House subcommittee hearing, suspends her indefinitely without pay and closes the office, sending the staff to the four winds.

Alice begins a self-spiral of regret and recriminations: her reputation in tatters—her self-esteem at an all-time low.  Paralyzed, she watches as her coworkers struggle to pull themselves out of the pit of Alice’s making and forge a path to redemption and self-fulfillment.

Will Alice manage to exact the revenge she needs to begin to live again?

Only A Pawn: Warriors for Equal Rights is the 2023 Gold Winner for Multicultural Realistic Fiction Human Relations Indie Book.

All Alice wants is to do the right thing.  But the powers that be have other ideas.

Alice’s struggles to meld her dysfunctional team into a crack federal investigative unit bringing workplace discriminators to justice have paid off.  She doesn’t regret the corners she cut to mete out justice.  But one egregious offender continues to elude her.  As she fights to nail the affluent, arrogant sex harasser, obstacles appear.

To make matters worse, a new employee, Royce, sends the office into chaos all the while the staff’s personal problems distract from their essential work.  The stress and anxiety send Alice into rehab.  Meanwhile, her team attempts to fend off the federal auditor bent on ending Alice’s career over her shoddy recordkeeping and failure to adhere to the rules.  Barely surviving a brutal grilling from a House subcommittee, Alice feels the harasser will go free.

 Will a white knight arrive in time to rescue Alice from checkmate?

All Alice wants is to retire. Until the call for justice gets in the way.

Alice Arden can’t wait to retire in eighteen months, but her boss at the federal discrimination and harassment agency she works at has other ideas. She assigns Alice to head a newly created task force responsible for catching more lawbreakers, and Alice can’t refuse.

Already burned out and suffering from a worsening disability that might put her in a wheelchair, Alice finds more than she had bargained for in her new team with racism, a sociophobe, and hidden agendas at play. Threats on their lives because of a case they’re working on drive Alice to the bottle until she discovers an unnerving secret.

Forget retirement. Alice is about to embark on delivering justice in the sexual harassment case of her career, and if she goes down, it’ll be with guns blazing.

Recently divorced Holly Jackson is forced to make a new life for herself that challenges the core of her beliefs when she finds herself at an ethnically diverse school. Shaken, Holly reveals her most intimate thoughts and feelings through daily journal entries. Her life takes a surprising turn as she begins to grow and finds the courage to overcome the fears that have trapped her in a world where she is alone.

La Grange, voted the capital of the Republic of Texas in 1838, is as colorful and audacious as the state itself. Its citizens were instrumental in winning the republic's freedom and have always been willing to fight for their beliefs. Many defend La Grange as the true capital of Texas, unfairly stripped of its title. The town flourished during the 19th century and witnessed the birth of a rough-and-tumble society, where arguments were commonly settled with fists, knives, and guns. In later years, immigrants flocked to the area and built a strong agricultural economy. The 20th century might have passed quietly into history if not for a Houston television reporter who publicized the demise of one of Texas's best-known brothels, the Chicken Ranch, located just outside of La Grange. The extensive publicity surrounding the closing of the "Best Little Whorehouse in Texas" resulted in a musical and movie of the same name, as well as a song by ZZ Top.