John Norman Maclean

Who is John Norman Maclean?

John N. Maclean, prize-winning author and journalist, has published four books on fatal wildland fires, most recently "The Esperanza Fire: Arson, Murder and the Agony of Engine 57", an account of an arson fire in 2006 in southern California that took the lives of a five-man Forest Service engine crew. The arsonist, Raymond Lee Oyler, became the first person ever to be convicted of murder for setting a wildland fire: Oyler subsequently was sentenced to death and is on Death Row in San Quentin State Prison. An early review in Booklist, publication of the American Library Association, noted: "It is a thoroughly engrossing read. In clear and precise prose, he lays out the facts about the 2006 Esperanza Fire in southern California that killed five U.S. Forest Service firefighters. Maclean treats his subject as a serious police procedural, giving readers the lay of the land, documenting communication as the fire was fought, and following-up with everyone involved."

Maclean is well known for his first book, Fire on the Mountain, about the deadly South Canyon Fire on Storm King Mountain, in 1994. Maclean is a former editor and Washington correspondent for The Chicago Tribune. His books are non-fiction, but novelistic in approach. Fire on the Mountainwas the Mountains and Plains Booksellers Association's best nonfiction title of 1999. It was made into a two-hour eponymous documentary by the History Channel that won the Cine Award for Excellence as best documentary of 2004 and was a finalist for an Emmy Award. Maclean is the son of Montana writer Norman Maclean, who wrote the well-known novella A River Runs Through It.