Deborah Kellogg Lewis
Author and Graphic Designer
Deborah Kellogg Lewis was born in 1955 and grew up in a small town in Southeastern Michigan. Her family were pioneers to the area in the early 1800's. A fascination with family history led her to write her first novel, Family Plot. She and her husband live in that same small town where they both grew up and are the parents of six children and seven grandchildren. In 1998 she earned a degree in Computer Science with a concentration in Graphic Design. She enjoys gardening, fiber arts, reading, and her family.
New Release
Family Plot
Family Plot tells the story of a pioneering family and their descendants from the perspective of the forty-two souls interred in the Kellogg Cemetery in Livingston County, Michigan. Their thoughts and feelings as life is coming to an end create a timeline of their relationships with each other and the world around them in fascinating detail.
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A beautiful blend of ancestry research and historical fiction. Deborah Kellogg Lewis, being a very gifted writer, brings out the personality and nature of the ancestors in her family cemetery in a folksy and heart-warming way. She takes you on a journey with each family member who is buried there, as they reminisce through events in their lives while facing their final days. Their stories express the flavor of the historical period that the person lived in, woven with life-lessons, insights and family connections that always manage to tug at your heart as they cross over to their final resting place in the family plot.
Praise & Reviews
This book starts in 1851 and tells of the journeys through life of the author’s ancestors . It is sad at times to read of their last days, yet comforting to know they were nearly always at peace with leaving this earth. In today’s world it is amazing that this family history can be traced to the mid 1800's. I found the book to be fascinating, funny at times, and heart breaking at other times. These were hard working, good people. As years passed and new technologies were introduced such as automobiles and televisions, it was amusing to read their reactions to “new fangled” ideas. All in all this was an entertaining and eye opening book.
This highly readable book is made up several dozen short chapters, each capturing the fictionalized ruminations of real people in the last hours and minutes of their lives. These distinct individuals are bound together by being buried in the same rural family cemetery outside Howell, Michigan. Deborah Kellogg Lewis, a descendant of some of these early white pioneers of the farmland of Livingston County, uses specific details from her voluminous research to breathe life into each story.
FAMILY PLOT is an engaging new approach to genealogy and storytelling. Each unique and compelling story is of a family ancestor approaching death who now resides in the family cemetery. These interrelated stories drive the reader forward to discover how each death affects other members of the family. Kellogg Lewis has managed to mix reality and fiction in a way that entertains while at the same time creating a new genre showing how future genealogists can tell their family stories.
FAMILY PLOT gives you a glimpse into the thoughts, feelings, and courage, as each family member struggles through the end of their life's journey. Revealing a time when life was hard and short and family was family, as well as the importance of holding onto the history of generations gone.
Riveting and important, Family Plot is a wonderful combination of family and local history augmented with historical fiction. As the author walks through the family cemetery, we hear the stories she has heard, the mysteries that she has unearthed, and the lives lost to history. The book brings to life the joys, trials and tribulations of a Michigan pioneer family that arrived in the area before Michigan became a state. I recommend it to anyone interested in life on the frontier of the Northwest Territory from the 1830s and through to today.