Jess Sellers, Writer
Jess Sellers
"Between every two pine trees there is a door leading to a new way of life."
- John Muir
Stories From Beneath the Trees:
The Undercurrent That Runs Through Everything
a celebration of trees, music, wonder, and friendship
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Stories From Beneath The Trees chronicles the author’s journey from beneath the trees at the family farm, to her service through music at medical facilities, and to “patches of wild” in noisy cities, where she encounters moments “that caught me by surprise and lured me from life’s
shallows into deeper waters.”
From old songs and hymns, lasting friendships, the natural world, wise elders, birds, and conversations with patients about favorite tree memories, Seller’s creates an intimate portrait of
our shared humanity, and its sanctity. A joy to read!
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I invite you into these pages to wander beneath the trees with me, to meet people whose lives are different from your own, and join us in our silence, merry-making, and sorrows. To travel with me into illuminating moments where you might find or lose yourself, where you might discover or rediscover your capacity for wonder. To journey into places where a different kind of treasure waits and wants to be found—that of our kinship with one another, and with the natural world.
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Stories From Beneath the Trees will be published by Sea Crow Press, November 2026. Follow along here, and sign up for my newsletter for updates.
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Early Praise for
Stories From Beneath the Trees
"Stories from Beneath the Trees is a heartfelt, heartwarming and heart-stoppingly beautiful book you will never forget. Wisdom, insight and poetry thread their way through stories of grief and love, music and memory, all attuned to the amazements of the natural world. Grace abounds here that will touch you deeply."
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—Kimberly Elkins, author of What Is Visible
"Jess Sellers' Stories from Beneath the Trees is a profound look at how we’re shaped by memory, love, and loss. Weaving myth and childhood memories together with stories of the patients she served through music, Sellers takes us on an unforgettable journey into the human psyche and search for meaning.
With compassionate and poetic prose, Sellers not only brings Alzheimer’s patients, the elderly and dying, and others our society hides away and ignores, to life; she also reveals them as our best teachers and wisest sages. Yet her vast embrace doesn’t stop there: it expands to include all forms of life, such as birds, seeds, and – perhaps most notably – trees.
This book will leave you feeling connected, inspired, and awed by the mystery and wonder of life and death."
—Rachel Jones, author of Grief on the Front Lines: Reckoning with Trauma, Grief, and Humanity in Modern Medicine
Reprint: "What Will You Remember at the End of Your Life?"
The Galway Review, Literary Magazine
Audio Version, "Remembering What We've Forgotten"
Best of Al Jazeera English Longreads
Featuring Narrator/Actress Loveday Smith
Publications
About Jess
I served as a musician in various
healthcare settings for twenty years,
visiting diverse patient populations
from age sixteen to one hundred in
hospitals, nursing homes, assisted living facilities, hospice, memory care, and rehabilitation hospitals. It was the most
rewarding work of my life.
I served these populations through community arts/music programs, ensembles, choirs, bands, as a singer-songwriter, and as a Certified
Music Practitioner (CMP).
In 2020, I retired as a musician and became a full-time caregiver for my husband, who suffered devastating, lasting affects from COVID-19. I turned to writing. As a life-long journal-keeper, writing has always been a part of who I am. I wrote my first "novel" on a Remington Streamliner manual typewriter at the age of ten.
Here's some organizations I love to support. Maybe you would too?
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