Where History Comes Alive!!

Explore the Great Cataclysms of the 20th Century!

Any day, it seems, America will go to war with the rest of the Axis powers, and Mack worries what will happen to Inga, his love.  This summer, the last summer of peace for a long time, the couple make the most of their time together.  Soon enough, Inga's father is suspected of espionage for the Nazis and Inga and her family must flee.   Meanwhile, Mack and his high school friends get caught up in the faceless machinery of warfare.  Hot swing music and slow romance, men and women hurriedly marry before all is lost.  Find out what fate has for Mack and Inga's families in the celebrated novel: 

In Love and War

It is the summer of 1941, in central Florida, and Mack has found himself in a dilemma.  He has fallen hopelessly in love with Inga, his classmate, and she is set to move back to Germany with her family because the US government believes her father is a Nazi spy.  As the second world war unfolds, Mack is drafted and a certain General is determined to put Mack at the controls of a B-17.  When Mack finds out he is to bomb Inga’s hometown, the tension is palpable.

 

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Contrition

Travel back to an even earlier time, and a simpler place, in the mountains of Utah with the Fratelli brothers, Bill and Hyrum, uncle and father to the familiar maverick character of Brigham Fratelli, pilot of the B-17 featured in In Love and War.

 

It is 1918, and Hyrum Fratelli has found himself about to lead a squad of men over the edge of a trench and into dreaded “No Man’s Land”.  He crosses his arms and lowers his head, praying Mormon-fashion.  The call to arms goes out and he is wounded and while convalescing he meets an Irish widow and her sister.  But he is scheduled once again to go into the trenches.  When he returns home and marries the sister, he must find a way to live a fulfilling lifetime with all the blood on his hands.  (Due out mid-2026)

Still in progress

Also available from Chris McClelland at Amazon and other retailers:  Under Old Glory a YA Novella  (see book review link below)

https://www.associationmormonletters.org/reviews/older-reviews/mcclelland-under-old-glory-a-novella-of-war-love-and-faith-reviewed-by-conor-hilton/

Praise for Chris McClelland’s fiction:

 

“The journey is always insightful, surprising, and deeply felt, and the reader always knows he is in good hands with Chris McClelland.”—Joe David Bellamy, Editors’ Book Award Winner

"Chris McClelland's story, 'Fine People', is a tender mixture of sad but hopeful." --Enid Shomer, Judge for Florida Literary Arts Alliance Best Short Fiction Award

 

“Chris McClelland’s fiction in the tradition of Richard Russo and Tobias Wolff, takes on the small dilemmas in our lives that often add to a deluge and he tells the truth.” –Philip F. Deaver, Winner of the Flannery O’Connor Award

 

“His stories are inflected with a tender and compassionate sensibility.  Readers looking for fiction’s quieter, subtle pleasures will do well to look here.”—Evan Lavender-Smith, author of Avatar and From Old Notebooks

 

“You will enjoy, as I enjoyed, spending an evening with [McClelland’s fiction]—Kyle Minor, author of Praying Drunk, winner of Independent Publishers’ Book Award

 

 “… McClelland’s unembellished prose is confident and self-assured throughout, and the subject matter is as philosophically challenging as it is emotionally poignant.

A sharp, moving reflection on how love can survive even the greatest trials.”—Kirkus Reviews on McClelland’s Debut Novel, In Love and War