A whistling woman and a crowing hen never come to a very good end. In the waning years of the 19th century, Bessie Daniels grows up in the small town of Hot Springs in western North Carolina. Secure in the love of her father, resistant to her mother’s desire that she be a proper Southern belle, Bessie’s determined to forge her own way in life. Or, as her Cherokee great-grandmother, Elisi, puts it, a whistling woman. Life, however, has a few surprises for her. First, there’s Papa carrying home a dead man, which seems to invite Death for an extended visit in their home. And shortly before she graduates from Dorland Institute, there’s another death, this one closer to her heart. But Death isn’t through with her yet. Proving another of Elisi’s sayings, death comes in threes, It strikes yet again, taking someone Bessie has recently learned to appreciate and cherish, leaving her to struggle with a family that’s threatening to come apart at the seams. Even her beloved Papa seems to be turning into another person, someone Bessie disagrees with more often than not, and someone she isn’t even sure she can continue to love, much less idolize as she had during her childhood. And when Papa makes a decision that costs the life of a new friend, the course of Bessie’s heart is changed forever.

Whistling Woman (Appalachian Journey)

Literature & Fiction

Tillery, CC

French, Christy Tillery

Hodges, Cyndi Tillery

Literary

Spring Creek Press

In the dawning years of the 20th century, Bessie Daniels leaves her home town of Hot Springs and travels east over the mountains to live with her new husband Fletcher Elliott in the Broad River section of North Carolina. Bess and Fletch stay with Fletcher’s parents for the first five years of their married life with Bessie teaching in a one-room schoolhouse and Fletcher working at the lumber mill in Old Fort while they save to buy property of their own on Stone Mountain. In 1906, they purchase 400 acres of the old Zachariah Solomon Plantation which includes a small house with a shack beside it, a branch of Cedar Creek and a row of dilapidated slave cabins... And ghosts. Thus begins Bessie’s next phase of life where the gift of sight she inherited from her Cherokee ancestors grows stronger, her healing abilities are put to the test, and she encounters a vicious secret society that tries to force her and Fletcher to turn their backs on a sharecropping family living in one of the cabins. When Bessie and Fletch refuse to give in to their demands, the group strikes back, bringing pain and suffering to their once serene existence on Stone Mountain.

Moonfixer (Appalachian Journey)

Hunter, Caitlyn

In the second decade of the 20th century, major world events resonate even on secluded Stone Mountain where Bessie Elliott lives with her husband Fletcher. There's a great war, one that takes away many young men, including Bessie's kin, some never to return. Bessie's role of healer intensifies as she treats those suffering from the Spanish flu and tries to keep it from spreading further on her mountain. She defends a young woman who's in the middle of a controversy that threatens to tear her community apart. And she finds herself involved in the suffragette movement as the women of North Carolina fight to gain their rights under the constitution. Then when one of her family members makes an appalling decision, one that has the potential to damage a child, Bessie impulsively steps forward to right the wrong.

Beloved Woman (Appalachian Journey)

Genre Fiction

In August1969, medical student Lizzie Baker sets off on a trip to Woodstock with her boyfriend and two other couples. When their van breaks down outside of Morganton, North Carolina, the group decides to hike up nearby Brown Mountain while they wait for the repairs to be finished.Lizzie’s interest in nature prompts her to go on a walk by herself, hoping to get a glimpse of the legendary Brown Mountain Lights. When she unexpectedly encounters one, she naively reaches out to touch it and is thrown back in time to a place and lifestyle she comes to hate—the Antebellum South.Lizzie is taken in by three sisters who are healers. With them, she is able to put her knowledge as a medical student to good use. She finds a trusted friend in Abbie, the youngest sister, and through a budding romance with the son of a plantation owner is drawn into the dangerous world of the Underground Railroad.With a bloody and violent war looming on the horizon, at a time when women are looked upon as less than equal, Lizzie struggles to accept the differences that surround her every day in this new and challenging world. Wanting nothing more than to return home, she and Abbie continually search for the light Lizzie travelled through, hoping it will take her back to her time.But if she finds it, will she decide to stay or go?

Through the Brown Mountain Lights

You don¿t always get what you want in life, and no one knows that better than Lizzie Baker. Her only wish is to go home, but in order to do so, she has to find the one light on Brown Mountain that transported her back in time from 1969 to 1859. When Lizzie¿s one opportunity is thwarted, she remains trapped in the antebellum South, a time she¿s come to loathe, but that¿s not the only reason she¿s anxious to return home. The Civil War looms ever closer and she is frantic to leave before the deadliest and bloodiest conflict in American history descends on Brown Mountain. Lizzie spends her days helping the Collins sisters doctor the people on Brown Mountain and in the little town of Morganton, North Carolina. While learning about the natural healing methods the sisters¿ use, she teaches them the more modern medicine she learned in medical school.But it¿s the nights that keep Lizzie going, searching the mountain with her best friend Abbie to find the one light that can take her home and engaging in secret meetings with Josh Hampton, a plantation owner¿s son, risking her life as she helps him lead slaves to freedom. As time goes by, Lizzie begins to care deeply for Josh, enough that she questions what she will do if the opportunity to go back to her time ever presents itself. Will she step into the light or will she choose to stay with Josh? She fears that when the time comes, she will only have a split second to make that decision and can only pray it will be the right one.

Seeking the Brown Mountain Lights

Romance

Time Travel

Although Lizzie Baker wants nothing more than to return to her time 110 years in the future, she remains stuck on Brown Mountain, NC during the time of the Civil War, the bloodiest conflict in American history. Very much a woman of the 1960s who believes in equal rights for everyone, Lizzie now lives in a world dominated by men, unable to offer anything more than medical treatment for slaves mistreated by plantation owners or women suffering at the hands of abusive husbands.No matter how much she wants to escape this primitive, barbaric time, Lizzie has no choice but to live the stifled life of a woman of the 1800s. She continues to learn herbal healing from the Collins sisters while helping her beau Josh transport runaway slaves to safety via the Underground Railroad. With the aid of her best friend Abbie, she begins a Relief Agency to send supplies to the army while running a medical clinic treating injured soldiers returning home.After she helps deserters flee from the Confederacy, Lizzie falls under suspicion of the Home Guard, an agency formed to track down traitors, draft dodgers, and escaped prisoners. If that isn’t bad enough, there’s always danger from bushwhackers who raid the mountain, looking for food and arms.When Josh decides to join the war effort, Lizzie and Abbie accompany him to the Battle of Gettysburg, the bloodiest conflict of the war. There, she and Abbie work as nurses in a field hospital until they find themselves retreating with the wounded and dying under General Robert E. Lee’s command.As the Union raids move closer to Brown Mountain, Lizzie becomes frantic to find her light and return to the future. On the anniversary of her fifth year on Brown Mountain, while she, Abbie and Josh are being pursued by bushwhackers, Lizzie encounters a light she thinks is hers. But when the light takes Abbie and begins to draw Lizzie in, she realizes it’s not the right one. Will Josh be able to save Lizzie and Abbie before the raiders capture him or will their fate be linked as they go through the light to an unknown destination?

Into the Brown Mountain Lights

"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.

Chasing the Brown Mountain Lights

Paranormal

Traversing the Brown Mountain Lights

Independently published

Leaving the Brown Mountain Lights

See the best price to sell, buy, or rent books by Tillery, CC. BookScouter helps to compare book prices from 25+ online bookstores and 30+ buyback vendors with a single search.

Books by Tillery, CC