J.L. Oakley's Blog

Thanks to everyone who entered my giveaway for TIMBER ROSE. 610 entered!

I'm very happy to announce that:
James MacDonald of Algonac, MI &
Amanda Arechavala of Melbourne, FL

The books will be winging their way to you.

Timber Rose debuted two weeks ago at Village Books in Bellingham WA. I had a wonderful turnout and sold a lot of books. They continued to sell after I left. I sold out in two days. Quite a nice start for a indie book at an indie bookstore. Now working on getting into more stores and doing some talks. I love talking about women who climbed mountains in skirts as they did in 1907. No underpinnings were going to keep them back.

The Kindle version should be out this week and I'm working on an audiobook for it.

In other news, Tree Soldier's audiobook is in full production and should be out at the end of May. I'm excited to have my novel is this format. I have a wonderful narrator, Jim Mentink, producing it for me. In February, I got a chance to hear what my words sounded like when a reader's theater one act play I wrote was presented at play festival.

Finally, Tree Soldier made it into the quarter finals for the Amazon Breakthrough Novel contest. I've been entering for years. First time into this level. One of 100 in the general fiction category.

What's up with your reading and writing?

For the past year, I have been working on TIMBER ROSE, the prequel to TREE SOLDIER. I'm in the last stages of getting ready for publication. Set in the wilderness town of Frazier 30 years earlier. Here are the particulars:

1907. Women climbing mountains in skirts. Loggers fighting for the eight hour day. The forests and mountains of the North Cascades are alive with  progress, but not everyone is on board.
Caroline Symington comes from a prominent family in Portland, Oregon. Much to her family’s dismay, she’s more interested in hiking outdoors and exploring the freedoms of a 1907’s New Woman than fancy parties and money. She plans to marry on her own terms, not her parents. When she falls in love with Bob Alford, an enterprising working-class man who loves the outdoors as much as she, little does she know how sorely her theories will be tested. Betrayed by her jealous sister, Caroline elopes, a decision that causes her father to disown her.
The young couple moves to a rugged village in the North Cascade Mountains where Caroline begins a new life as the wife of a forest ranger. Though she loves her life in the mountains as a wife and mother, her isolation and the loss of her family is a challenge. As she searches for meaning among nature, she’s ushered along by a group of like-minded women and a mysterious, mountain man with a tragic past.
Eventually, her relationship with her mother and sister improves and things seem to be taking a turn for the better. That relationship is tested again when her uncle and her sister's ruthless ex-husband muscle their way into the national forest, threatening the nature she loves, and more importantly, the man she loves. Though Caroline desires to reconcile with her family, she knows she must take a stand.

TIMBER ROSE is about gilded society, thugs and big timber meeting the newly formed Forest Service, mountaineering clubs and a young woman's desire to make her own way in a changing world.

TIMBER ROSE is the prequel to the award-winning TREE SOLDIER.

It's a beautiful evening in Bellingham, WA. Sun is going down below the bay, the islands that looked forested mountains on the water. They say there will be a blue moon tonight. I will be writing,but step out to see. There is a coolness in the air. Summer is passing and fall is coming on fast. I can feel it in the bones. Which means I have so much to do.

First, TIMBER ROSE into its template for publishing, an essay off for a lit competition, a little trip to France and then two months of book visits with Tree Soldier.

All is good.

Just wanted you to know that I'm participating in Maria Grace's Summer Banquet Hop in which we write about food. Make a comment on my blog and you will be put into the pool to win a copy of award-winning TREE SOLDIER which was selected for a EVERYBODY READS community read in the Snake River Valley communities in WA and Idaho. So excited!

Here is the URL for the blog post and other authors participating. Check us out!

http://historyweaver.wordpress.com/20...

2012 has turned out to be a great writerly year for me. In December alone, two essays and a long article were published in a diverse range of publications: "Finding the City of Whatcom" in the Journal of Whatcom Historical Society, "First Walks" in the Clover Literary Rag and "The ANN PARRY," in the wonderful Sea Chest, a publication by the Puget Sound Maritime Society. An essay "Sallie" will be in the Anthology "Loyalties" for Whatcom Reads. My county is reading Snow Falling on Cedars. Honored to be in all of them.

Nothing has been better, though, than seeing TREE SOLDIER take wings. It won the 2012 EPIC ebook award for historical fiction and was a grand prize winner in that category for Chanticleer Book Reviews. I'm touched when readers come up to me and tell me how much they loved the novel and then go on to tell me about their fathers or grandfathers who were in the CCCs. Glad to tell the story of the boys who built our parks and planted trees nearly 80 years ago.

Was excited today to be featured at Celebrating Authors with an excerpt from TREE SOLDIER. Thanks so much. http://celebratingauthors.blogspot.co...

Thank you all for participating in the giveaway. The books are on their way to the winners.

Congrats. Thanks to all of you who participated in my giveaway. The following readers will be getting a copy of the book in the next week or so.

Lori Sabo

Deja Jane Coffin

Sam Castleberry

I hope you will enjoy the novel of CCC boys in the woods and hero Park Hardesty who hopes to find redemption and forgiveness there.

Nothing is more satisfying for a writer, than to have her work acknowledged and honored. I found out today that my Great Depression novel, Tree Soldier, is a grand prize winner for Chanticleer Book Reviews. This means it will be getting some attention in the next few weeks. And personally, the more the novel succeeds, more attention will be drawn to the great works of desperate young men in our national and state parks, agricultural and recreational districts during the 1930s. The trees they planted and buildings they built are all a part of the CCC legacy.

http://chantireviews.com/2012/08/13/g...Tree Soldier

Very surprised and excited to receive a Blue Ribbon Award from Chanticleer Book Review for Historical Fiction. Been very humbled by the comments. I'll learn more about TREE SOLDIER's progress in this contest.