C.J. Mercer — Fiction from the Smoky Mountain Foothills

C.J. Mercer

Fiction from the Hiwassee corridor and the Smoky Mountain foothills

Eight books. Written and releasing soon.
The first five chapters are free.

The Author

I'm C.J. Mercer. I'm not much for websites, but the books needed somewhere to land. Here it is.

Over the years, like most of us, I've had a lot of stories set up shop in my mind. Can't help it when you're on a hike listening to the wind in the trees.

After long enough, I needed to get some of them down on paper. I did that. Sharing them with you is the next step, I suppose. That's how these things work.

What are they about? Mostly my part of the country — southeastern Tennessee, north Georgia hill country, the corridor between the ridgelines. It doesn't get much attention from the outside and never has. There's a lot of history in a small piece of ground out here. People who've been here a long time know things that don't get written down anywhere.

I guess that's where I come in.

The Series

Between the Ridges

Eight books — southeastern Tennessee — releasing monthly

The series is written — six novels and two prequels. I wanted to know where the road went before I asked anyone to follow it.

It is set in country I know — the Hiwassee and Ocoee corridors of southeastern Tennessee, the land between the ridgelines. It has been logged and mined and flooded and left to find its way back, and mostly it has. The people there stayed through all of that. They know things in a particular way, and they have a particular patience with anything that takes time to explain. Those are the people in these books.

Book One

If you want to see how it starts, I can send you the first five chapters and the trail guide to the corridor — both free.

That's the easiest place to begin.

Send me the preview

Marly Dodd drives a shuttle route through the Hiwassee and Ocoee corridors. She moved to this part of Tennessee a few years back and decided to stay, which surprised her more than anyone.

Webb Sutton has been guiding and logging the same rivers for twenty years. He keeps careful notes.

The Rating That Kills — Between the Ridges Book 1

Neither one of them set out to investigate anything.

The Rating That Kills opens with a body at a river take-out and a pattern of reviews that shouldn't add up the way they do. It ends somewhere further than either of them expected.

The series is written. They release one a month, starting soon.

Releasing Soon

Get Word

Leave your email and I'll send you a free preview of the first book — the first five chapters of The Rating That Kills, along with the trail guide to the whole series — the roads, the rivers, the places you'll be passing through. It comes in both PDF and EPUB, so you can read it however you like.

After that, I'll let you know when each book releases and anything else worth knowing. I don't write often — only when there's something to say. If you ever want off the list, say so and you're off. No argument from me.

Most folks who stay with these stories are the kind who pay attention.
If that sounds like you, this will make sense pretty quickly.