James Farrelly, a native of Beaver Falls, Pennsylvania, taught English for 28 years in the Conewago Valley School District near Gettysburg, PA. His creative pursuits include writing literature and music inspired by the natural world and the places or ideas that give color and meaning to our lives.

Sun Wind Silversea ~ Wondrous Stories and Other Enchantments features four interwoven works following the tempo of a Sun Processional. Each story is set in a different time and place across the planet we call home. The book is intended “for children of all ages,” and its purpose is to awaken and keep alive the sense of wonder at the root of our loving and grateful presence in the One Life we all share. The wonders and enchantments within the book are best revealed when read aloud. In this way the written word comes alive as breath and sound, entering the stream of life in accord with the oral origins of literature. This shared experience of reading and listening will enhance an embodied engagement with the text; it can further an exploration of the ways language shapes our lives, our ways, our worlds. Perhaps in reading this book, our children, and the child who is always alive in us, may be better equipped to set our planetary compass toward a world with greater love, acceptance, and peace–a meliorism made possible through a more cooperative synergy with the rhythm of natural life governed by the life-giving Sun. The book is an invitation to make an effort to listen and attend to our wisest teacher—Great Nature Herself. While each of the four stories is different in setting, style, and content, they are united in this underlying intention: to foster greater respect for the interconnectedness of all life, and renew our efforts in nurturing it, preserving it, living it. Sun Wind Silversea is a book that may grow with us as we continue to grow; it may help uncover our deepest human potentials–even though there is hardly any human being as a character in it. Until there is . . .