Where Are They Now?

(If you are unfamiliar with G'Narr, please read "A Blast From the Past?" to set the stage for today's interview.)

Today, we have a real treat, as Diary of a Chainman was able to track down G'Narr creator John McFetridge for a classic Q & A interview. Plus, we received permission to post this lost classic on YouTube nearly 20 years after it's inception at a small Toronto airport hotel.

Hi John, thanks again for agreeing to this interview!

Q. Who are you?

A. I'm John McFetridge.

Q. Where are you from?

A. I was born and grew up in Greenfield Park, a suburb of Montreal and now I live in Toronto.

Q. What is your product, service, etc...?

A. I write crime fiction novels.

Q. What makes you laugh?

A. All kinds of things. Lately I really like found comedy, unplanned things caught on video or short video clips online. Slapstick. But I also like a good storyteller.

Q. Who were your influences getting started?

A. I watched a lot of TV growing up and I really liked sitcoms; Welcome Back Kotter, Happy Days, Barney Miller. They were like one-act plays. I liked Mel Brooks movies. I loved the Planet of the Apes movies. I liked Twilight Zone (but that I saw in reruns) and Star Trek. When I moved into writing books I was a big fan of Elmore Leonard and James Ellroy.

Q. What is the biggest challenge for fiction writers today to overcome?

A. We are usually our own worst enemies. Too much second-guessing, too much cutting ourselves off at the knees before getting started. For me, I needed to write a lot of stories that simply weren't very good before I was able to write things that better. But when I started I knew what I was writing wasn't good enough, the same way someone stating to play a musical instrument knows that they aren't any good the first time they pick up the instrument. But we have to work through that stage. I had to write entire short stories to find a scene or even a few sentences that were saying things the way I wanted them said. The temptation to give up can be overwhelming.

Q. What question would you most like to be asked and what is the answer?

A. You received more than a hundred rejection letters before your first acceptance, was it worth it? And the answer is yes.

Q. For an artist who discovers themselves ahead of their time, what is the best thing to do?

A. Keep at it, the world usually catches up. Don't change what you really want to do. When the world does catch up not only will it feel great, you'll have a lot of back catalogue ;).

Q. How did you get there from here? By this I mean, how did you go from G'Narr in 1995 to successful mystery author nearly 20 years later?

A. After G'Narr I got hired to rewrite an action movie and then I wrote a couple more movie scripts that were more drama than comedy. There's some real truth to that old line about dying being easy and comedy being hard. I sold a couple of options but the movies never got made and I couldn't get any productions of my own off the ground. I always felt that the script for G’Narr was good but the production wasn’t… let’s say, ‘what it could have been’ – I’m no director. I was still working on movie crews in Toronto (driver, location scout) and a fellow crew- member, Scott Albert came up with the idea of co-writing a book of short stories about working on a movie crew. The result was Below the Line. I was so happy with the way the book came together that I wrote en entire novel on my own, Dirty Sweet.

Q. Any Easter eggs, inside jokes or behind-the-scene memories that G'Narr fans might get a kick out of?

A. We didn’t really have time for anything like that. Maybe someday we could have a reunion and do an audio commetary, there may things in there I don’t know anything about. My wife is in it about three times. G'Narr is played by cartoonist Randy McIlwaine, the drinking game is take a shot every time a logo had to be digitized out. Almost every crew member ended up playing a part. I got to meet Spider Robinson and tell him how much I loved his story, "God is an Iron."

Q. What's next for John McFetridge?

A. I'm going to write a few more books in the "Eddie Dougherty" series, a cop in Montreal in the 1970s. And I am co-editing, with Kevin J. Anderson, a book of short stories inspired by songs by the band RUSH. Kevin's contribution will be a novella called 2113. Last year Kevin wrote the novel CLOCKWORK ANGELS based on the RUSH album of the same name.


Thanks again John, that was amazing! Be sure to let us know if there is ever a G'Narr cast reunion!

For interested fans I have created a separate page with YouTube links for the entirety of the G'Narr saga!

Sometimes I feel like Dick Loudon from Newhart; the semi-successful D.I.Y. author who dreams of writing great works of fiction. But always seems too busy with the surreal circumstances of his "real life" to get around to it.

Other times I feel like myself and work on turning those dreams into reality by researching how independent authors today are turning the tables on traditional publishing. Especially by utilizing billion dollar self-publishing venues such as Amazon and social media promotion.

As an author I am lucky to earn between 10 to 15% percent royalties via traditional publishers. Amazon averages 70%, plus has a slew of cool marketing tools and their best-selling Kindle platform. Which I admit to using on my own Android powered pad.

It was while doing such research that I discovered Kareem S. Butler, author of Flight of The Falcon, the first in a series of original eBooks. What I really liked about this independent author was the dedication to developing an entire Wiki based his unique story-telling worlds.

This kind of speculative fiction hearkens back to the "years best" sci-fi and fantasy compilations that I cut my teeth on as a young gaffer. Thanks again to Kareem for agreeing to this interview.

Q. Who are you?

A. I am Kareem S. Butler a first generation Star Wars Geek who loves ancient history and mythology. I am an alumni of Brooks Institute of Photography, the author of 9 World Chronicles and web master for Mytholipedia.com and TheBookOfEarth.com websites.

Q. Where are you from?

A. I grew up in Central California, living most of my childhood in Fresno, Ca . I lived the bulk of my life in Central and Southern California, before settling in the South West a few years ago.

Q. What is your product, service or promotion?

A. My product is a science fiction novel series entitled The 9 World Chronicles, which tells the story of mankind’s fight to free itself from an alien enslaver.

Q. What makes you laugh?

A. Everything Dave Chappelle does, South Park, Karl Pilkington and currently the Adult Swim series “Black Jesus”.

Q. What is something most people don't know about you?

A. My favorite TV show of all time is the short lived science fiction series “Cleopatra 2525” starring actress/model Jennifer Sky, and sci-fi Queen Gina Torres.

Q. What are you working on right now?

A. I am currently working on the second book of the 9 World Chronicles series. I don’t have a working title for it yet. I am also teaching myself Anime Studio for a little animation project that is simmering on the back burner.

Q. Who are your influences?

A. My influences were George Lucas, JRR Tolkien, and the Greek poet Homer. Its funny to say but the first time I saw Star Wars was literally a life changing event. It sparked an interest in film making and story telling which would lead me to pursue an education in film production and a desire to tell my own story.

Q. If you could communicate one thing to the entire world simultaneously, what would it be?

A. Chill out, we are all just humans. The world that we share is a big, scary place with mysteries by the ton and we have to stick together if we want to succeed as a species. We have some huge challenges facing us and this planet; we really need an all hands on deck approach. Many of the barriers between the various people of our planet are self created. Let’s try to step up.

Q. What advice do you have for anyone who wishes to follow in your footsteps?

A. Give in to your creative side, nurture it, and never let it die. It’s very easy to give up or get distracted. Embrace the process, enjoy being able to do what it is that you love. The success comes later, some times when you are not even thinking about it.

Q. What is one thing you would do to make the world a better place?

A. I would inspire people to be more open minded, to see the world from a bigger perspective than just your own side of the fence. We often create our enemies by choice, in ideology, in culture and in beliefs. To understand an equation we look at all sides, taking into account what divides it as well as what adds to or subtractions from it. We have to understand each component to understand the whole. Without perspective this we can find no answers, with out this we find no resolution.

Q. What makes for a good question?
A. A good question doesn’t have an easy answer. It forces the challenger to look for answers within his or her self  as well as from external sources.


Thanks again Kareem for your insightful answers. I had completely forgotten about Cleopatra 2525 and continue to stand amazed at the life-altering legacy of Stars Wars. For anyone interested in an original read by an insightful speculative fiction author I highly recommend Flight of the Falcon. Can't wait for the sequel!