JuliAnne Sisung
  
*** New book! ***
The Peninsula Series
Red Jackets Angels
ISBN-13: 979-8320612607
Published March 2024
Book#1 - NEW!

No one saw the flames or smelled the smoke, but they knew without a doubt an inferno in the Italian Hall was raging toward them, waiting to engulf and incinerate everyone.

Heddi escapes and takes refuge in the vast forests of Michigan’s Upper Peninsula. She forages and steals to survive, finds companionship with a coyote pup, a laughing bird, and an ornery old man who is difficult to understand and harder to abide.

Mister James, unable to run from the memories of his former self, walks into the woods trying to find the tenacity to end his life. But first, he wants to fish for coasters, the tiny, resolute trout which live in the Salmon Trout River flowing through Yellow Dog Plains. Not to eat. He would never kill them. They are treasures. When his dream is met, he
thinks, maybe he’ll find the strength to let the river current take him.

Red Jacket Angels is about an unlikely relationship formed from the
ashes of disaster and revealed from two distinct perspectives.


The North Michigan Series
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Curse of the Damselfly
ISBN-13: 979-8526750516
Published January 2021
Book#1

Cora stared at her son’s face but didn’t see his eyes were glassy and fixed, the pupils large. Jesse swallowed, trying to speak when there was nothing good to say; words couldn't change anything.

When diphtheria hits Pere Cheney, Jesse and her mother treat the sick using medicinal herbs cultivated from the forest surrounding their log home. But in 1893, people knew little about epidemic illnesses and believed a witch’s spell, an Indian curse, or a woman’s sin could cause their afflictions.

Meet Bert the lumberjack, Esther the storekeeper, Ed with angry ancestors, and papa Milos. With their help, Jesse confronts a deadly disease and struggles to save a dying town - and herself.
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Beyond the Crooked Tree
ISBN-13:979-8407450542
Published January 2022
Book#2

It’s 1893, and Jesse leads the Juhasz caravan west and north to escape persecution. With her baby beside her, she and her family and friends - including six orphan children – ford rivers, battle raging blizzards, and forage to survive in north Michigan woods.

Jesse heals the Odawa chief’s son, puts Bean Pole’s broken bones back together after a lumbering accident, and beats land baron John McGinn with a shovel. And Esther sings daily – sometimes in two or three voices at the same time. Bert pulls peppermint sticks from an endless pocket, and orphan Hope carries Dulcebella on her shoulder because the scruffy chicken is her spirit totem.

Beyond the Crooked Tree
is miracles and imagination, possibilities and great history.
Promises, Vows and Treaties
ISBN-13: 979-8367035513
Published December 2022
Book#3

“Kajika memaangoshens, kaa gwaii?”
The nun gasped. “That heathen language is not allowed at Holy Childhood, Sir! What did you say to them?”
“I told them my name, Sister.” He raised his eyebrows. “But maybe you have a number for me, too. Oh, yes, and I told them I was a mule.”

Jesse and her friends fight to save the Odawa tribe’s children from the sisters of Holy Childhood Indian Boarding School and the Odawa men from prison. The three-story brick building is ominous, a fortress where Indian youth are kept captive, forbidden to speak their own language, their clothing burned, hair hacked off. And more.

Kajika enlists Jesse to hide designated children deep in the woods, and Sister Mary helps the tribe save their offspring and pays a price.

In
Promises, Vows and Treaties , you’ll anger at cruelty, and you’ll smile at love. You will curse broken promises, rejoice in kept vows. You’ll wonder about the power and value of an acre of land.
Standalone Novels
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Sophie's Lies
ISBN-13: 979-8612814580
Published March 2020


She wanted to remember the pleasant nights and wished they all had been, but wishes were paper that burned into ash and floated to the sky.

The Harley rider paid no attention to the posted signs and drove down her driveway, so Sophie grabbed her shotgun. She knew how to use it and was ready to protect her goats and fowl, her babies.
But why hadn’t the peacocks screeched a warning?

John Wayne, fresh from Iraq, finds serenity on Sophie’s land, but it’s clouded by mysteries she clarifies in her own good time through stories told while watching flames in a campfire. Tales of her life from the 1960’s to the 21st century explain how lies are born from the fertile womb of wishes.
The Idlewild Series
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Leaving Nirvana
ISBN-13:978-1544260136
Published March 2017
- Book #1

The more she knew her, the harder it was to realize she'd never know her. She could only love her.

Abby and her Irish father run a hotel in Idlewild, Michigan, a small-town resort for middle-class Negros. Through fire, KKK crosses, rapes, beatings and marriage to a local man, Abby learns the destructive power of oppression in all its forms and the value of honor.

The resort began in 1915 and was an Eden for African-Americans until 1964 when the Civil Rights Act made the resort unnecessary. Della Reese, Sammy Davis Jr., B.B. King and other famous black entertainers played there and made it the most notable resort in the nation. This account imagines what happens when honor confronts bias.
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The Whipping Post
ISBN-13:978-1544260136
Published March 2018
- Book #2

“I’m not sure of any of this, but I’m tired of hating you. I’m tired of being afraid, so . . . I’ll be there at church. Can’t say I’m forgiving you because I just don’t know. We’ll have to see about that part.”

Idlewild is a nature lover’s dream. In the twenties, it planted seeds of integration, and Black families found peace in this small-town nest of tranquility surrounded to the north and south by horrific, discriminatory activities.

Irish Abby tries to unite the community and shoves headlong into trouble trying to do the right thing. Unfortunately, she isn’t sure what right is, only what it should be or could be.
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Ask for the Moon
ISBN-13:978-1093576481
Published April 2019
- Book #3

“You’ve got to be careful when you ask for the moon, Abby,if you don’t know what it’s made of.”

Abby, a small-town woman, and her father run two hotels in Idlewild, a growing resort in Michigan’s north west. They host church services, funerals, meetings and baptisms.

It is the “roaring twenties” when jazz, women’s liberation, wild dancing and Jim Crow laws surface and shock the nation. Abby continues to fight the bigotry she despises.

An old man and a baby create heartache and joyful triumph in the 1920s Michigan resort town. When Pastor Jenkins yells “Get the log out!” everyone understands what he’s talking about, and they pluck the offending timber from their eyes.
The Family Saga Series

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Elephant in the Room
ISBN-978-1-4958-0201-0
Published August 2014
- Book #1

It's 1890 and the lumber boom transforms Hersey, a small Michigan farming town. It brings lumberjacks, money, corruption and seven saloons to the once peaceful village. Beautiful, young Kate defies convention, falls in love with Mark, a dubious lumberjack, and grows into womanhood.

Kate also loves her family, a philosophical hobo, a cussing, moonshine drinking woman, a red dog with an attitude, and Mel, her faithful friend.

Elephant in the Room is about character, family, life and love.
Photo of Angels in the Corner, by Author Juli Sisung
Angels in the Corner
ISBN-978-1-4958-0425-0
Published January 2015
- Book #2

"Damn! Sorry," she says, and means it - almost every time. Kate, a single mother of four daughters, stuggles to survive in the forest cabin she loves during the declining lumber boom. Willful grit still rules her. She washes dirty lumberjack clothes and grows her food.

With Harley, the scruffy, philosophical hobo's wisdom, Bug's eye rolling antics, hellishly handsome Jack's protection and Mel's deep, abiding love, she finds contentment and learns to say thank you.

Angels in the Corner is about changing relationships . . . among friends, loved ones and between the unique yet parallel generations.
Light in the Forest
ISBN-978-1-4958-0655-1
Published July 2015
- Book #3

Spanish flu attacks Hersey, ravaging the village, and Kate fears for her family. She struggles to keep them safe as one daughter leaves home, one gets pregnant and one is kidnapped.

Strong women of three generations define their relationships with one another, and with those they love, as America enters WWI and young boys leave to fight.

Light in the Forest is about frailties,strengths, and what we mean to others. It's about a spark of light in a dark place.
Place in the Circle
ISBN 978-1-4958-1065-7
Published June 2016
- Book #4  

A stranger comes to Hersey, bringing bigotry, selling lies, and sowing distrust, causing some to flee and some to fight: Kat and John for their clinic, Kate and Mel for Sammy, Becca for love, and others for survival.

Heart strings and funny bones are tangled with the eighty-five year old Baxter twins, who say what others only think; with Harley and Verna, who find love on the banks of the Mississippi; and two fear-provoking, eye-rolling wolves.

Place in the Circle is about love, family, and friendship . . . a shelter in the howling winds of change.


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