Margaret Wilson McLain is quick to say that her book, “God is a Strange Fellow” is a non-traditional Christian work.

“It has a spiritual flair but it’s not based on Biblical quotes,” she said.

However, the book was written on the premise that it matters not how meager one’s beginnings or how checkered one’s past, “If ye be willing and obedient, ye shall eat the good of the land,” Isaiah 1:19.

“‘God is a Strange Fellow’ depicts the lives of African-Americans in a small Midwestern community in the 1940s,” said McLain, a former Trojan who writes under the pen name, Margaret Wilson Quinn. “It takes place back when times were hard and it’s a story about how tragedy can be turned to triumph.”

The main characters in the book are Miss Honey and Miss Sister and their story depicts the way life used to be and how people cared about each other and were willing to share what they had.

“I wrote this book because I have 10 grandchildren and one of them, Jordan Wilson, is in high school in Troy,” McLain said. “I wanted to write the book for them. Another reason is because we live in a crazy, mixed up world and I wanted to tell others about a time when neighbors cared about each other and looked after each other.”

Although ‘God is a Strange Fellow” is a “true fiction,” it is based on stories that were passed down through McLain’s family, primarily great-great aunts and her mother, who lived in the community that is central to the story.

McLain now lives in Middletown, Ohio and teaches in the public school system there.