Chris McClelland, Author

 The other day I did something I rarely do anymore. I googled an editor-friend from back in my active days in the academic/literary publishing world. I had tried to get in touch with him a couple of times, but he seemed incommunicado. Well, I found out that Michael Curtis passed away this January. He, especially in the early days of a correspondence that lasted almost thirty years, taught me much about writing stories, and about writing as a craft to incrementally master. For that I will always be grateful. He first started writing me back in 1992, and I saved every one of the dozens of rejection letters he sent back. At first, it was just a sentence or two, just suggestions. As time went on the sentences grew to paragraphs, and Mike exhibited a warmth, and a solid encouragement, and for that I will always be grateful, too. I got to meet him twice during this time of correspondence; once at Rollins College in Winter Park, Florida, where he was giving a talk to the writing students set

  A story, more than anything, must be alive.   It must have a pulse and driving emotion that hooks the reader into the narrative.  As more time goes by and I find myself further distanced from the academic, "literary" world, it becomes more clear to me what makes great fiction in my own mind.  Unlike what I have heard in some academic circles, it is not a prerequisite that to be admired a work must put the reader to sleep.   It is actually very freeing to read someone like Harlan Coben or Stephen King and enjoy it for the pure storytelling aspect, the propulsive drive from page to page, the addictive compulsion to keep turning pages.   Reading such a book is indeed satisfying an addiction and in a way that I would say is much healthier than most addictions.  With my wife, I currently belong to The Book of the Month Club, and good reads abound there.  The most recent novel I have read came from there, SHE STARTED IT, a deliciously twisted plot line of a British book, where a

  I have been down lately, not only because so many people I know and love have died in the past few years.  I no longer dream of achievement or success on a material, or reputational, level with mainstream or literary publishers, but that leaves me feeling that my pursuit of writing is somehow disillusioned.  I decided a long time ago, years ago now, to focus on self-publishing, so that I have taken myself out of the running of being respected as a fiction writer.  It all just saddens and confuses me.  I have my own little corner of the Mormon literary world, and that is fruitful in what I read and write.  Dean Hughes' Children of the Promise series is magnificent, and I hope to meet him in person some day.  I think some of my historical fiction work may have a chance with LDS, or other Christian/inspirational type publishers, but I don't have a full book manuscript to show them. So, self-publishing, with Mormon undercurrents, with historical themes.  That seems to be where I

I have been very depressed lately, starting two days ago when I found out that my cousin Catherine passed away.  She and I were on parallel courses for a long time, having been born less than one week apart.  She was actually my second cousin, daughter of one of my father's first cousins.  Catherine is not her real name.  With the help of my father, she escaped an abusive marriage and changed her identity.  That decision probably saved her life and that of her son.  She was a good-humored, witty woman, who was fond of puns and word play.  We got along great together, and I will find in the months and years to come a big hole in my life because of her absence from this Earth.   Her passing causes me to think about my own mortality, and how she and I are literally the same age, and I am guessing, because she struggled with diabetes related illnesses her whole life, and both of us struggled with diabetes.  But if her passing is not a wake up call for me to take better care of myself,