We recently connected with John “Mac” MacIlroy and have shared our conversation below.

John “Mac”, thanks for joining us, excited to have you contributing your stories and insights. We’d love to go back in time and hear the story of how did you come up with the titles to your books?

My fiction book, “Whatever Happens, Probably Will: Stories” is considered an “eclectic” collection, the eighteen stories in it are not linked by common characters or places or even time. By way of contrast, two great contemporary linked story collections are “Florida” by Lauren Guof and “Lost in the City” by Edward P. Jones, the authors in each case linking the stories together through place.

Although I didn’t have that kind of clear connection, what I did think I had in my collection — somewhere — was a (way more) elusive thematic thread. It seemed to be something along the lines that many of the most interesting — as well as powerful and consequential — things that happen to us spring from the everyday. These are the small choices we make all the time, only to see them slide sideways to the deeper end of our experience, and even imagination. And just about the time I was struggling with the challenge of title, things in the real world were really beginning to tumble out of control: the covid Zombie Apocalypse slammed home, folks all over the place soon mumbling something about “it is what it is,” with others chiming in with the “if it can happen, it will happen” grip of Murphy’s Law.

So, in the midst of all this, I naturally started reading Katie Mack’s terrific book “The End of Everything, Astrophysically Speaking.” If she succeeded in convincing me that the universe could end at any moment, she had also taken me to the (perhaps) more comforting discussion of “the multi-verse.” There, as I understand the theory, every outcome of every action is a possibility, infinite in some kind of endless spiral. Even if I may have the quantum physics of this all wrong, it is precisely the kind of thing writers think about all the time — although our challenge, especially in the short form, is usually to strip a narrative to just a few choices and their outcomes. Anyway, with this quantum boost joining Murphy’s Law and the Zombie Apocalypse somewhere in the attic (or maybe antics) of my mind, one happy day “Whatever Happens, Probably Will” popped out, and I never looked back.

The two “Not Exactly Rocket Scientists” books were a different — and easier — journey to a title. Both of these books are collections of “mostly true” stories that clearly linked characters, time, and place, the process was collaborative, and no-one had to dive into quantum physics.

In round one — the zany and shared misadventures of kids stumbling their way around the mid-fifties and sixties, making a general mess of things — we looked no further than the first (and maybe the best) story in the collection: when everyone went crazy that the Russians would beat us to the moon, we stepped right up — along with our close companion Mr. Stupid — and began building our own backyard rockets, which of course soon proved a greater threat. We took that story, “Not Exactly Rocket Scientists,” slapped it on the cover, added the “and Other Stories” subtitle, and we were done.

NERS round two was also stupid easy. The stories continue to link characters, time and place, this time with the frothy nonsense of the Age of Aquarius handing us an exceptionally colorful context for a continued decade of again screwing up everything. No real spoilers here, but we did add the zany delights of “the road trip” to the mix, including a close call at the grave of Lenny Bruce, curling lessons on the ice of a two-star ski resort, meeting a curious character named Rasputin at a University called Virginia, attending the fraternity house trial of a rascally resident mouse, and even sharing a little rye whiskey with Jerry Lee Lewis.

Yes, Mr. Stupid was still along for the ride. So we slapped a “II” on the original title, added a little tongue-in-check negative mojo by hitching up “The Totally Unnecessary Sequel” sub-title, and called it a day. And if we lacked daring here, with just a little white-out and a fine-tipped pen we could resurrect our old NERS I business cards.

John before we move on to more of these sorts of questions, can you take some time to bring our readers up to speed on you and what you do?

Here’s my story, and it challenges Fitzgerald’s caution that there are no second acts: I found one, with passion. 

But to get there I need to dust off the years of a modest career spanning the law, politics and business. These were the “day jobs” which paid the bills, and they took me from the courtroom (which was often scary, but mostly for my clients) to the top of a prison wall in the middle of a riot (a bit scary too, this time for me); from the halls of Congress (staffing back when it all worked) to the factory floor (when we actually made things in this country). There were about a thousand stops in-between — often by air, when flying was actually fun. Happily trailing along for most of this ride, however, were a series of university adjunct teaching assignments, as well as appointments to a number of rewarding public commissions. These were the “evening jobs” which fed the soul, and included a late-career post as Executive-in-Residence at the Eli Broad School of Business at Michigan State University.

But it’s all mostly a blur now — the airline mileage points gone long ago —  and I closed those chapters when I retired to the Carolina LowCountry some years ago. Maybe it was the lessons of the tides, or maybe just the lengthening shadow of the years, but I soon found myself failing my retirement. Quite utterly.

My sense of purpose had frayed like the old cotton shirts I was wearing, along with the nagging sense of things left undone. There may have been a caution about this in the fine print of the retirement brochure, but I clearly missed it. And it all could have gone very bad, and quickly, but for . . . a DARE.

Yes, a dare, and while the details of this dare are a hoot — involving a little demon rum, and a kind of “Big Chill” reunion weekend with old friends — they are too long for this “meet and greet.” But the takeaway is this: on that dare to join two other life-long friends in writing “mostly true” stories about our zany small-town boyhood misadventures, I had the first sense that my needle was moving, and I had found a renewed purpose.

Of course, we had no grand design or organizing principle or any of the many other things we should have been worrying about had we known what we were doing. But as the stories piled up in random confusion — someone soon suggesting we consider selling the book by the pound — it suddenly dawned on us that all this was precisely the point: We had ALWAYS been pinheads with (mostly) good intentions, barely muddling through and sure to find a way to screw up just about everything, everywhere. That was the creative “moment of truth,” the whole thing quickly framing itself around one idea: everybody likes finding out that other people make a mess of things too, most of us winging it from start to finish.

The title flowed from this, with “Not Exactly Rocket Scientists and Other Stories” published in 2017. With the gentle PG texture and nostalgia of the stories of writers like Bill Bryson and Jean Shepherd, it caught the attention of Pat Conroy. He called it “a great book about friendship” — and we would have been quite happy with just a “pretty good.” Tony Dow, who played Wally Cleaver on “Leave It to Beaver,” followed, saying reading the stories was “like hanging around with Lumpy and Eddie and the guys from the show again.” And readers who still want to jump aboard — and to our delight the book is still available — may see something of their own childhoods too. Together we rambled through the early school years — no substitute teacher was ever our match, we couldn’t catch a cold on the ball field, and even disaster befell us when we sought redemption in church. We learned many other things too, but mostly that the magic of youth fades away a little at a time, until it just isn’t there anymore.

Although I was still wearing those frayed cotton shirts, I had made a colorable claim to a “Second Act:” I was a published author, and all on a dare.

Two new projects followed.

I again joined my friends in writing the sequel to “Not Exactly Rocket Scientists,” and In a burst of creative genius we titled it “Not Exactly Rocket Scientists II: The Totally Unnecessary Sequel.” Released in the fall of 2022, it picks up as we three rushed headlong into the chaos of the mid-sixties. Twenty new “mostly true” stories (more PG-13 in tone) show us wandering through the frothy promises of the Aquarian Age,proving that while we hear that kids grow up — and we tried — we just didn’t.

At the same time, I also began writing short fiction, certainly much edgier in tone and texture. With tough-love editing, I was able to put together my debut collection “Whatever Happens, Probably Will: Stories.” Released in May of 2022, and earning Advance Praise from a number of leading contemporary short story writers, it was named a “Finalist” in the 2022 International Book Awards in the Category of Short Fiction.

And if there is any real organizing principle in this collection,I like to think it is this: the truly powerful things that happen to us often begin with the familiar and commonplace, only to slip sideways to the deeper end of our experience, and even our imagination. That’s what I try to capture in these stories, and what I hope is “the hook” for the reader. In some, that slip is subtle, air-brushed with a sly and sometimes subversive wink. In others, the slide creeps in after a teasing and slow burn, pivoting on things whispered and unseen along the margins of the characters’ lives. And sometimes the story runs headlong into a true gut-punch, the emotional payoff delivered to the reader early and strong, with attitude.

This was much the true genius of great writers like Rod Serling — I grew up watching his “Twilight Zone” series — and Edgar Allan Poe, as well as my favorite modern master of the short story, T. D. Johnston. In his recent Canvas Rebel interview — terrific job, Canvas Rebel — he talked about all this, and especially the importance of “singular effect” as the emotional payoff to the reader of a short story. I am sure that I don’t always get there. But for the sake of this conversation — and maybe a teaser for anyone who wants to dive into my book — I think I sometimes do, and the best example of all this in the collection is my story “Duke’s.” It’s a very short story, the whole thing beginning its slide to emotional payoff on the utterly unremarkable idea that most people know that you don’t put mayonnaise on a pastrami sandwich.The story earned a “Best of 2019 Short Story” recognition, so I must have gotten this one right.

Yes, indeed, this “Second Act” was certainly more fun that a prison riot.

”

Is there something you think non-creatives will struggle to understand about your journey as a creative? Maybe you can provide some insight – you never know who might benefit from the enlightenment.

That’s a great question, although I think it too harshly divides “the creative” and the “non-creative” into different camps, like some of the challenges on “Survivor.” I would suggest instead that few successful business entrepreneurs will get very far without a very healthy aptitude and respect for the creative, nor will many writers succeed without a very healthy respect for structure, discipline, and process. 

But let’s go with the duality for now, over-simplified for this conversation:

Managing a case (been there) or running a company (been there too) imposes certain structural demands and norms of performance and conduct not necessarily associated with, say, writing a collection of short stories (got there, too, if late). More to the point, the consequences of failure in the business and professions are usually not self-contained, tending to spill all over the place when things go bad. In other words, failure here can be consequential in a very broad — and painful — way.

Maybe that’s precisely where any “struggle to understand” begins.

Failure is, of course, no stranger to the creative, and painful. But this burden of “consequence,” heavy in the larger world, is usually much lighter for the creative: it rarely spills out beyond a very narrow circle. (Sure, there are some dandy exceptions: think those catastrophic big-budget movie flops that have sunk an entire studio, and the huge advances for those books that fail to sell.) But for most of us the creative journey is one “writ small,” our failures rarely a ripple in the scheme of things. Maybe most of our success too. And I wonder, at least on some level, if all that doesn’t create a kind of “so what?” dismissiveness in the larger rough and tumble business and professional world. I mean, who doesn’t hear the “English Major” jokes as the kids in college today flock to their MBA’s? And maybe there’s something to this anecdote, from a time when I was still plodding through the business world: a colleague — and he was just beginning to reach the top of his business game — suddenly walked away from it all . . . “to write a book.” Heads up and down the corporate suite shook for weeks — and that’s my point.

But we creatives think that what we do matters — the story that inspires a child, the book that soothes a wounded heart, the painting that moves the soul. Yes, maybe we’re wired a little differently, and perhaps we run on a modified currency – well, to a point: nothing like a royalty check.

But in the end, maybe I have gone full circle: that even writing (my now-space) a short story that fails seems to me infinitely more satisfying than even the most successful business plan (my ex-space) ever did. All I ask of those kids heading for those MBA’s is this: don’t forget to keep a good book of short stories on your night-table, and maybe every so often slide away from the martini-fueled discussions of debt-ratios and supply-chain logistics and all the rest at that crowded after-work bar, and join us writers for the cheaper house wine at that quiet table in the back. I think we’ll both be glad you did.

What do you think is the goal or mission that drives your creative journey?

I suspect that my creative journey is driven more by goal, and probably a bit less by mission. But both are in there, and maybe the best way to pull it all together is to answer the question I more often get: “why do you write?”

You already know about the origin story of my first book, but I’ll go a little deeper here.

And the best place to start rests in a few passages in the Introduction to “Not Exactly Rocket Scientists II.” It describes an evening many decades ago when I joined my friends around a campfire on a Northern Jersey beach, just days away from graduating high school. Strangely aware that we had already begun to leave the place and people of our childhood, we shared many of the stories I write about. Others, as they should, were private then, and will remain so. The muffled sound of the slow rollers in the surf was indifferent to us then, and those who had come before, and those who would come later. Even the least imaginative of us could feel the wanting — the need — to scratch something in the sand, above the high-water mark, that said “I was here.”

Well, the sun came up in the morning, on schedule and in the right place, and we groggily broke camp with the first of many goodbyes to come. I will never forget that magical night, nor will I ever forget the tragedy of Superstorm Sandy that wiped that beach clean away many years later.

But writing — and now knowing that at least a few of my stories and books are resting on bookshelves somewhere — is now my scratch in the sand, a defense against the terrors of the fates and the unknown, and maybe most of all the lengthening shadows of the day:

“I was here.”

Yes, I think that’s it.

Contact Info:

• Website: (1)notexactlyrocketscientists.com (2)johnwmacilroy.com (3) shortstoryamerica.com
• Instagram: no 
• Linkedin: yes
• Twitter: no
• Facebook: All over the place
• Youtube: Various postings @ www.youtube.com, including MacIlroy as Featured Writer at the Conroy Literary Center, August 11, 2022 “Whatever Happens, Probably Will: Stories” for  “open mic” story readings
• Yelp: no
• Other: Here’s a sampling of some fun podcasts, reviews, press releases, interviews and readings: https://anniejennings.com (October 12,, 2022) grandstrandmag.com (March 2023) https://www.spreaker.com (Interview with Arroe Collins, June2018) lhttps://lowwcountryweekly.com (October 12. 2022) https://www.pr.com/press-release/880938 (March 10, 2023) Also Google “Whatever Happens, Probably Will: Stories” for more