Appalachian Journey Series | Brown Mountain Lights Series - by CC Tillery
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Book Seven of The Brown Mountain Lights Series is now available
"Traversing the Brown Mountain Lights", Book 7 in our Brown Mountain Lights series, is now available in ebook and paperback format. Hardback and audiobook coming soon!
This book takes Lizzie and her husband Jonah through three centuries as they travel from Lizzie's time in the 20th century back to the 19th century, at a dangerous and unstable period of time in the South, to try to change the fates of Lizzie's former fiance and his wife, then forward in time to the war-ravaged 21st century to learn the fates of and hopefully help the friends they left behind.
Will Lizzie return to her time, where she feels safe and secure, or will she once more find herself stranded in another century, where danger lurks around every corner?
This book takes Lizzie and her husband Jonah through three centuries as they travel from Lizzie's time in the 20th century back to the 19th century, at a dangerous and unstable period of time in the South, to try to change the fates of Lizzie's former fiance and his wife, then forward in time to the war-ravaged 21st century to learn the fates of and hopefully help the friends they left behind.
Will Lizzie return to her time, where she feels safe and secure, or will she once more find herself stranded in another century, where danger lurks around every corner?
Book Six of The Brown Mountain Lights Series is now available
We recently released Leaving the Brown Mountain Lights, book six of our Brown Mountain Lights series. It’s available at Amazon as an ebook and paperback. Hardback and audiobook coming soon!
We hope you enjoy Lizzie’s journey as she and her fiance Jonah, her best friend and fellow healer Abbie, and the people of Brown Mountain and Morganton prepare to defend the mountain against a mysterious invading foreign army. As people flee the invading force, Lizzie’s skills as a healer are in constant demand tending to the sick and injured and her conflict with her nemesis Constable Jackson resolves in an unforeseen way. When the army finally infiltrates the mountain, Lizzie is once more forced to make a decision: stay and fight for the mountain or step into her light to safety?
We hope you enjoy Lizzie’s journey as she and her fiance Jonah, her best friend and fellow healer Abbie, and the people of Brown Mountain and Morganton prepare to defend the mountain against a mysterious invading foreign army. As people flee the invading force, Lizzie’s skills as a healer are in constant demand tending to the sick and injured and her conflict with her nemesis Constable Jackson resolves in an unforeseen way. When the army finally infiltrates the mountain, Lizzie is once more forced to make a decision: stay and fight for the mountain or step into her light to safety?
Book Five of the Appalachian Journey Series now available
We’re happy to announce that Granny Woman, Book 5 of the Appalachian Journey series, is now available as a Kindle ebook and will shortly be available in paperback and hardback at Amazon. This is actually an interim book, written during a year in the lives of Bessie and Fletcher Elliott when Fletch went to work in a coal mine in Beckley, West Virginia in hopes of saving their struggling farm during the Great Depression.
Granny Woman or Granny Witch is an Appalachian term applied to women who were healers and diviners, usually of Celt and Cherokee blood. Since Bessie definitely qualified, we felt it an apt name for the book.
This was an interesting book to write due to the history and subject, and much research went into coal mining and miners. Although we initially didn’t think we would write about this simply because it was a dark year in Bessie’s and Fletch’s lives, we are glad we did because it gave us a chance to illustrate the hardships and dangers of coal mining while extolling the miners who risk their lives in order to ensure our every day comfort.
We hope you enjoy spending time with Bessie and Fletch as well as meeting a host of new characters and circumstances. Please feel free to contact us at any time with questions or comments. We love hearing from our readers.
Granny Woman or Granny Witch is an Appalachian term applied to women who were healers and diviners, usually of Celt and Cherokee blood. Since Bessie definitely qualified, we felt it an apt name for the book.
This was an interesting book to write due to the history and subject, and much research went into coal mining and miners. Although we initially didn’t think we would write about this simply because it was a dark year in Bessie’s and Fletch’s lives, we are glad we did because it gave us a chance to illustrate the hardships and dangers of coal mining while extolling the miners who risk their lives in order to ensure our every day comfort.
We hope you enjoy spending time with Bessie and Fletch as well as meeting a host of new characters and circumstances. Please feel free to contact us at any time with questions or comments. We love hearing from our readers.
Chancing the Brown Mountain Lights Wins 2021 Firebird Award
April 2021 – Speak Up Talk Radio announced the winners of 2021’s first quarter FIREBIRD BOOK AWARDS contest. Eighty-four winners were announced in 98 categories.
One of the winning entries was from author CC Tillery whose book titled Chancing the Brown Mountain Lights won in two categories: Dystopian Fiction and Time Travel Fiction.
Authors and publishers from around the world submitted their work to the Firebird Book Awards. A panel of 12 judges within the writing and publishing space then read every book and independently scored each entry according to a set of standardized criteria that evaluates the quality of the writing as well as production aspects. Only entries with the highest of scores are awarded the coveted Firebird.
Patricia J. Rullo, founder of the Firebird Book Awards, says, “This quarter’s entries were a joy to read and speak to the talent out there. At Speak Up Talk Radio, our mission is to offer radio interviews and podcasting services to help authors expand their reach. In addition to additional prizes, our winners have the opportunity to be interviewed and aired on iHeart Radio, Pandora, as well as 50 additional online venues, giving them new ways to speak up and share their work.”
Pat adds, “We’ve included a charitable component to our awards by making all entry fees tax-deductible to the author. In return, we personally make and send handmade fun and whimsical pillowcases to women and children in homeless shelters via Enchanted Makeovers, a 501(c)3 tax-exempt organization. All entry fees fund this project. In this way, authors can get notoriety for their work while doing good for others. It’s been such a rewarding venture for everyone.”
The Firebird Book Awards run quarterly contests so authors can receive recognition on a timely basis. Authors from all genres, mainstream, independent, and self-published are welcome. Additional winning authors and titles as well as entry information is available at https://www.speakuptalkradio.com
One of the winning entries was from author CC Tillery whose book titled Chancing the Brown Mountain Lights won in two categories: Dystopian Fiction and Time Travel Fiction.
Authors and publishers from around the world submitted their work to the Firebird Book Awards. A panel of 12 judges within the writing and publishing space then read every book and independently scored each entry according to a set of standardized criteria that evaluates the quality of the writing as well as production aspects. Only entries with the highest of scores are awarded the coveted Firebird.
Patricia J. Rullo, founder of the Firebird Book Awards, says, “This quarter’s entries were a joy to read and speak to the talent out there. At Speak Up Talk Radio, our mission is to offer radio interviews and podcasting services to help authors expand their reach. In addition to additional prizes, our winners have the opportunity to be interviewed and aired on iHeart Radio, Pandora, as well as 50 additional online venues, giving them new ways to speak up and share their work.”
Pat adds, “We’ve included a charitable component to our awards by making all entry fees tax-deductible to the author. In return, we personally make and send handmade fun and whimsical pillowcases to women and children in homeless shelters via Enchanted Makeovers, a 501(c)3 tax-exempt organization. All entry fees fund this project. In this way, authors can get notoriety for their work while doing good for others. It’s been such a rewarding venture for everyone.”
The Firebird Book Awards run quarterly contests so authors can receive recognition on a timely basis. Authors from all genres, mainstream, independent, and self-published are welcome. Additional winning authors and titles as well as entry information is available at https://www.speakuptalkradio.com
Whistling Woman now Available in Hardcover!
Wonderful news! Amazon invited us to participate in their beta program for hardback books, and we chose Whistling Woman as the first for this new publishing venture. For all those readers who have inquired about purchasing our books in hardcover, it is now available at Amazon. We will be moving on to the others in the near future.
We're excited for this opportunity and appreciate more than we can ever express all the encouragement, support and inspiration from our readers. We would not have gotten where we are without you and are blessed to share this journey with you.
We're excited for this opportunity and appreciate more than we can ever express all the encouragement, support and inspiration from our readers. We would not have gotten where we are without you and are blessed to share this journey with you.
The Walker Sisters - our model for the Collins sisters in our Brown Mountain Lights series
I'm not sure if we ever relayed this, but in our Brown Mountain Lights series, the Collins sisters (Sarie, Maggie and Abbie) are modeled after the Walker sisters who lived in a log cabin their father built in Little Greenbrier Cove in the Great Smoky Mountains - late 1800s going into the 1900s, holding a lifetime lease on the property for the rest of their lives after their land was made part of the Great Smoky Mountains National Park. The six sisters (one married and moved away) cut their own wood for cooking and heating, hunted and fished, grew herbs for healing as well as vegetables and fruit, spun their own wool from sheep they raised which they dyed with berries or bark, and grew cotton and flax they turned into textiles with their father's cotton gin which they then used to sew their own clothing, They once said, "Our land produces everything we need except sugar, soda, coffee and salt." I can't imagine living this kind of life without electricity or running water but they managed quite well. Here is a picture of the sisters, who from oldest to youngest were Margaret, Polly, Martha, Nancy, Louisa (pronounced Lou-eye-za), Sarah Caroline and Hettie. They each bear a strong family resemblance, don't you think?
Chasing the Brown Mountain Lights is now available!
We are pleased to announce that we just released the ebook version of Chasing the Brown Mountain Lights, Book 4 in our Brown Mountain Lights series, at Amazon. The paperback version should be available very soon. We hope you'll enjoy this book, as Lizzie's life veers off in a different direction, one that spells more danger and adventure as she continues to search for her place and time in the world.
Here's a brief synopsis:
“I’m a Stranger Here” could be the song title guiding Lizzie Baker’s life. In the five years she spent on Brown Mountain during the Civil War, Lizzie wanted nothing more than to find the light that transported her back in time and return to the 20th century. While fleeing from bushwhackers, Lizzie, her friend Abbie Collins and fiancé Josh Hampton encounter a light Lizzie believes is hers. Hoping to get to safety, she pushes Abbie into the light, expecting Josh to follow. She and Abbie wake to find that this is not the Brown Mountain they remember. Trees and foliage are dying, the air smells like ash, the sky is hazy and dim. And Josh is nowhere to be found.
Shocked to learn they’ve gone forward to the 21st century, Lizzie finds this time strikingly similar to that of the 19th as the people on the mountain fight for existence in a world that is dangerous and barely survivable. While searching for her fiancé, she and Abbie encounter Jonah Hampton, a man who bears a startling resemblance to Josh. Upon learning that one of Jonah’s ancestors married a Collins, Lizzie begins to suspect that Josh did not come after her but, for some unexplainable reason, married Abbie’s sister Sarie instead.
Once more, Lizzie resorts to practicing herbal medicine by day while frantically searching for the lights by night, concerned that going back to Josh could possibly end the existence of people she’s come to care for. To make matters worse, her tenuous relationship with Jonah sets in motion a perilous encounter with an enemy from her past that could lead to her death.
Lizzie faces a hard decision as she continues to search for the lights, one that will determine her fate for the rest of her life if she finds them: to stay in the 21st century where a war within America looms on the horizon, go back to the 19th century and risk ending the lives of those she’s come to love, or return to the comfort and safety of her time in the 20th century.
Here's a brief synopsis:
“I’m a Stranger Here” could be the song title guiding Lizzie Baker’s life. In the five years she spent on Brown Mountain during the Civil War, Lizzie wanted nothing more than to find the light that transported her back in time and return to the 20th century. While fleeing from bushwhackers, Lizzie, her friend Abbie Collins and fiancé Josh Hampton encounter a light Lizzie believes is hers. Hoping to get to safety, she pushes Abbie into the light, expecting Josh to follow. She and Abbie wake to find that this is not the Brown Mountain they remember. Trees and foliage are dying, the air smells like ash, the sky is hazy and dim. And Josh is nowhere to be found.
Shocked to learn they’ve gone forward to the 21st century, Lizzie finds this time strikingly similar to that of the 19th as the people on the mountain fight for existence in a world that is dangerous and barely survivable. While searching for her fiancé, she and Abbie encounter Jonah Hampton, a man who bears a startling resemblance to Josh. Upon learning that one of Jonah’s ancestors married a Collins, Lizzie begins to suspect that Josh did not come after her but, for some unexplainable reason, married Abbie’s sister Sarie instead.
Once more, Lizzie resorts to practicing herbal medicine by day while frantically searching for the lights by night, concerned that going back to Josh could possibly end the existence of people she’s come to care for. To make matters worse, her tenuous relationship with Jonah sets in motion a perilous encounter with an enemy from her past that could lead to her death.
Lizzie faces a hard decision as she continues to search for the lights, one that will determine her fate for the rest of her life if she finds them: to stay in the 21st century where a war within America looms on the horizon, go back to the 19th century and risk ending the lives of those she’s come to love, or return to the comfort and safety of her time in the 20th century.