A tragic story beautifully rendered by an author known far and wide to consistently pay attention to painstaking detail. In Ash Wednesday, Author Paula McClain depicts a harrowing moment in American history by penning a fictional account of a fire in an improperly designed school building, in as industrial area of Cleveland, Ohio, on the outskirts of downtown.

It is Ash Wednesday, 1908-, and forty-six-year-old Swiss immigrant, Fritz Hirter, is the janitor of Collinwood’s community School. It is winter, and Fritz, the father of five and married to Eva, takes pride in his supportive role, in a community that seems to give short shrift to its immigrant population. Well aware of corners cut during the school’s recent expansion, Fritz is vigilant in his task of keeping the building properly heated, in the face of the school’s structural vulnerability. It is dangerous work, tending to the basement’s boiler system, and Fritz’s heart is in every gesture of maintaining the building where his young children are being educated.

In this tightly woven, present tense short story, McClain gives minute-to-minute details of a spontaneous event spinning out of control and ending in community tragedy. Questions of responsibility, blame, and community shame are at issue in this seemingly personal story, in view of its central character.

Ash Wednesday is Paula McClain at her reliable best and is an installment in her A Point in Time, a transporting collection of short stories about pivotal moments, past and present, that change lives. It’s a riveting, compelling story with a troubling aftershock made important by the fact that McClain has expertly brought it to light. Paula McLain

Note: Ash Wednesday is available on Amazon as an E-Book!

About Paula

Paula McClain received her MFA in poetry from the University of Michigan in 1996.

McLain’s essays have appeared in Town & Country, Good Housekeeping, Real Simple, O the Oprah Magazine, Huffington Post, The Guardian, the New York Times and elsewhere. She is also the author of the memoir, Like Family: Growing up in Other People’s Houses, two collections of poetry, the debut novel, A Ticket to Ride, Circling the Sun, The Paris Wife, and When the Stars Go Dark. She lives with her family in Cleveland, Ohio.