Jane Kirkpatrick heads west to the coast in new series
Published 9:30 am Friday, July 11, 2025
- Jane Kirkpatrick’s new book, “Across the Crying Sands,” is the first in The Women of Cannon Beach, a trilogy of books inspired by pioneering coastal women.
Popular Central Oregonian and New York Times bestselling author Jane Kirkpatrick has the first of a new historical fiction trilogy out. The book is “Across the Crying Sands,” and the cycle of books is called The Women of Cannon Beach.
How she came upon the story of Mary Gerritse diverges from her usual means of making stories out of historical figures and events.
“Usually, some little thing happens and there’s some unresolved question and I end up going, ‘I wonder how that happened?’” she said.
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But the seed that was planted for “Across the Crying Sands” came from a fan and constant reader named Suzy Wintjen, of Seaside.
“About 13 years ago, this woman who’s now a friend … drove to Woodland, Washington, where I was signing books,” Kirkpatrick said. “She said, ‘I have your next story.’”

Historical fiction author Jane Kirkpatrick will make appearances Thursday at Roundabout Books in Bend and Wednesday at Sunriver Books & Music to promote her new book, “Across the Crying Sands.”
Kirkpatrick had her own ideas. Several, in fact, but hey, thanks.
“I tried to be gracious, and she was like, ‘Oh, OK,’” Kirkpatrick said. “But through the years, she would send me stuff about Mary Gerritse,” a mother and intrepid coast settler who delivered the mail in a difficult, treacherous part of Oregon.
“She would go through documents, and she located interviews that had been done with Mary, because she became quite iconic,” Kirkpatrick said.
The New York Times-bestselling author has lived in Central Oregon for many years, now calling Redmond home half the year, with winters spent near Palm Springs with her 95-year-old husband.
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About three years ago, she concluded she was done with writing, “but Suzy was, like, on my case. She said, ‘Think about this. I think you could do something with this book.’”
Wintjen got through to Kirkpatrick, who ended up proposing not just one, but three books based on the life of Gerritse and the development of Cannon Beach — with some help from Wintjen.
“Because of my husband’s health, I knew I couldn’t travel to do as much research, which is what I like to do, but she was a research wizard,” Kirkpatrick said.
“She and her husband had four children, and she started delivering the mail, and they hired a nanny to look after the children,” Kirkpatrick said.
The unanswered question concerned Gerritse’s modern lifestyle, one which “I thought … was unusual for the 1890s, for a couple to have made that decision. Something Mary needed in her life, she was not getting by being a stay-at-home mom, so she chose to do rather dangerous and high-adventure work,” Kirkpatrick said.
“I think wealthy families at that time had nannies, but John and Mary, they were living on the edge. They were not a wealthy family at all,” she said. “A homestead on the coast was just treacherous. People abandoned so many homes because they couldn’t make a living there.”
She learned a lot of interesting things about Gerritse and Cannon Beach, some of which she shared at Roundabout Books Thursday. On August 16, she’ll visit Sunriver Books & Music (57100 Beaver Drive).
The second book in the series is written but not yet titled. It is scheduled for release April 21, 2026. Kirkpatrick expects the third book will be published later next year.
Gerritse lived until 1957. She had a long life, but not an easy one.
“The third book I’m really struggling with because there were a lot of tragedies with their children,” Kirkpatrick said. “It’s part of life, I guess, part of the journey, but how you deal with it is part of what I think Mary’s legacy is. Despite terrible losses and terrible tragedies she found a way to keep going, and that’s very inspirational for the rest of us, in my mind.”