Welcome to Melinda Clayton's Official Website
Clayton writes with a raw immediacy, and the multiple narratives satisfyingly converge to create an intense and compelling atmosphere.
Review of Blessed Are the Wholly Broken
-Publishers Weekly
About Me
A writer of primarily southern psychological suspense, Melinda Clayton’s work includes two series: The Cedar Hollow Series, which includes novels Appalachian Justice, Return to Crutcher Mountain, Entangled Thorns, and Shadow Days, and The Tennessee Delta Series, which includes Blessed Are the Wholly Broken, A Woman Misunderstood, and Child of Sorrow. Clayton also authored Making Amends, a standalone novel of psychological suspense, as well as two nonfiction works of family genealogy and numerous articles and short stories in various print and online magazines. A retired licensed psychotherapist, Clayton currently works as a writing tutor, an editor, and an instructor for Southern New Hampshire University’s COCE MFA program.
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My Books
The Cedar Hollow Series
Appalachian Justice
2013 Global Ebook Gold Medal Winner
2013 Finalist for University of North Carolina-Wilmington's Summer Reading Program
In 1945, three local boys witnessed an in- cident that called Billy May Platte’s sexuality into question. Determined to teach her a lesson she'd never forget, they orchestrated a brutal attack that changed the village of Cedar Hollow, WV forever.
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Return to Crutcher Mountain
As recounted in Appalachian Justice, Jessie is an adult survivor of hor- rendous childhood abuse. At the age of thirteen, she was rescued by reclu- sive mountain woman Billy May Platte. Now 47, Jessie is outwardly successful but inwardly struggles to reconcile the broken pieces of her past.
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Entangled Thorns
Born into the infamous moonshining Pritchett family of Cedar Hollow, West Virginia, Beth Pritchett Sloan has spent the majority of her life trying to escape the memories of a difficult childhood.
Unfortunately, the arrival of an un- welcome letter is about to change everything.
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Shadow Days
Struggling to make peace with the death of a husband who’d been lost to mental illness, Emily Holt vows to drive to the end of the road, which, she’s surprised to find, is just outside the tiny mining town of Cedar Hollow, West Virginia.
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Cedar Hollow Series Boxed Set
(ebooks)
Snippets from Cedar Hollow: A series of short stories about the characters in the Cedar Hollow Series
The Tennessee Delta Series
Blessed Are the Wholly Broken
After the heartbreak of losing their newborn son to a previously undiagnosed genetic condition, Phillip and Anna Lewinsky manage to patch their lives back together and move forward, filling the emptiness with friends, work, and travel. When Anna unexpectedly finds herself pregnant again at the age of forty-three, desires clash and misunderstandings abound until only tragedy remains.
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Stand-alone Novels
A Woman Misunderstood
When Rebecca Reynolds finds her parents murdered, she assumes her sister will soon be arrested. But in a family of dysfunction, no one is truly innocent.
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Child of Sorrow
When fourteen-year-old foster child Johnathan Thomas Woods is suspected of murder, an old letter and a tacky billboard advertisement lead him to the office of attorney Brian Stone, who finds himself in a race against time to save an angry boy who, more often than not, doesn’t seem interested in saving himself.
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Nonfiction Family Genealogies
Making Amends
On a beautiful fall evening, five-year-old Bobby Clark is kidnapped by his father, a shiftless man with a history of domestic violence and drug abuse. He isn’t seen by loved ones again until a fateful morning twenty-five years later, when he’s charged with murdering his father.
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Press
Appalachian Justice
Billy May's colloquial narration will draw readers in and make them feel like they are sitting vigil at her bedside as she discusses the injustices of her past. The tale [Clayton] weaves brings Cedar Hollow and its mountain to life in brilliant and horrifying color.
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News and Gifts
Melinda recently signed a contract to provide supplemental materials (short story) for Monte Cook Games' "Old Gods of Appalachia" RPG. Stay tuned for more information.
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