Julie is the award-winning author of the novels In Another Life (Sourcebooks, 2016) and The Crows of Beara (Ashland Creek Press, 2017). Her work has appeared in several journals, including Gold Man Review, Emerge Literary Journal; Mud Season Review; Cirque: A Literary Journal of the North Pacific Rim; in the print anthologies Stories for Sendai; Up, Do: Flash Fiction by Women Writers; and Three Minus One: Stories of Love and Loss; and featured on the flash fiction podcast No Extra Words. She holds undergraduate degrees in French and Psychology and a Master’s in International Affairs. Julie leads writing workshops and offers story/developmental editing and writer coaching services. A hiker, yogini, and nonprofit finance administrator, Julie makes her home on the Olympic Peninsula of northwest Washington state. 

The rest of my story

I was born and raised in the Pacific Northwest and I live not far from my childhood home on the Olympic Peninsula of northwest Washington state. I returned to this place of peace and beauty after thirty years of adventures elsewhere, including high school and college in central Washington, study and teaching abroad in France, Japan, and Chad, graduate school in the Midwest, and a career as university study abroad program administrator that took me around the world. In 2006, I moved to New Zealand where I attended culinary school and entered the wine industry. Returning to Seattle in 2008, I worked as a wine buyer before moving to the Olympic Peninsula in 2013. Here I have written four novels and I’m working on my fifth. I craft stories about characters searching for a sense of self and place. I hope to move readers with fiction that navigates the borders of heart and mind.

In Another Life (Sourcebooks), was inspired by the Cathar Crusade and is set in present day and 13th century France. It was named Book of the Year (Fantasy, Adult Fiction) by FOREWORD Indies at the 2017 American Libraries Association Annual Conference. 

The Crows of Beara (Ashland Creek Press), was a finalist for The Siskiyou Prize for New Environmental Literature, judged by PEN/Faulkner author and Man Booker Award nominee Karen Joy Fowler. It takes place in contemporary Co. Cork, southwest Ireland, and weaves together themes of industry vs. the environment, addiction, creativity, and hill walking.