Meet Fred McBagonluri, a Scientist and Novelist

Dr Fred McBagonluri

If you have no time to write, you definitely were not born to write. All those who have the passion to write find time to do so including one person who was a finalist in the selection interview for NASA astronaut in the USA and had it not been financial constraint that limited the number of those to be chosen at the time, he would have made a name for himself as the first black African born outside of the USA to go to Moon and would also have achieved his long-held dream.

Fred McBagonluri is this man. This man of multiple talents who, upon hearing of the Apollo 11 lunar landing, started corresponding with NASA, whilst still a pupil at the University of Ghana primary school, was born in East Legon, Ghana. He was the second of three sons and his grandfather was the chief of the Upper West Region of Ghana. He attended the St. Louis Prep School and graduated with a distinction from Nandom Secondary School. He briefly attended the St. Augustine's College in Cape Coast before attending Central State University, graduating with BS (summa cum laude) in Manufacturing Engineering. Later he obtained MS Engineering Mechanics from Virginia Tech and a PhD, Materials Engineering from the University of Dayton. He is married to an equally excellent novelist Diana, who consider herself as a true African writer (more about her later).

Dr. McBagonluri was a former employee of Siemens Hearing Solutions and headed the Research and Development department of the company. He was voted in 2008 as the Most Promising Black Engineer of the Year and in that same year won the New Jersey State Healthcare Business Innovator Hero Award. He is a co-inventor for three issued US patents. Currently, he is a Sloan Fellow at MIT. And Fred, whom I got to know through a friend Francis Kwaku Egu, exudes humility. For in spite of all his tight schedules, he took time to reply my all my emails. 

And Fred is a novelist too. He has two published novels and a memoir to his credit, with a fourth one due in December, ceteris paribus. Below are a list and synopsis of his novels.

Dusk Recitals: The Growing Years--March 2009

In this autobiographical novel, Fred McBagonluri delivers the startlingly rich and compelling story of one boy and the infinite courage and confidence he musters to break free from a life of famine and hardship. Through unparalleled determination and a keen intellect, he finds his way to America, where he creates for himself a life of learning and, in the end, international respect as a leading scientist. In this poetic and evocative novel, the author has delivered a lyrical tale that lingers in the mind and heart long after the final page is read. Get Dusk Recitals: The Growing Years from amzon.

A Woman to Marry--February 2009

Fred McBagonluri's lyrical novel, A Woman to Marry, is a fascinating and compelling look into one man's journey across three continents. The saga of Dery and Trish transcends the concept of love story and carries the reader across a lifetime of struggle and discovery. Dery, an American of Ghanaian heritage, succeeds academically as an innocent young man at Harvard. As he matures, however, he cannot separate the brutal death of his father in Africa and the deceptions heaped upon him by the women he loves. In his quest for the truth, he meets Trish, and together they share his desperate need to bring his father's assassins to justice, in a world where justice has rarely prevailed. Only through renewed love and trust is this tormented protagonist finally able to put to rest a lifetime of anger and pain. A copy of A Woman to Marry is available at amazon.

When Tears Stand Still--February 2007

This is the tragic and poignant story of Lemo, a young woman full of praise and ambition, whose life was cruelly cut short by AIDS. Born into the royal family of Putiha, in West Africa, her idyllic early life is described with great charm. But misfortune seemed to dog her. Men and women alike were attracted by her great beauty, but rape and seduction led, all too soon, to her downfall and death. This story is in a sense a morality tale for our age; Lemo stands for so many, in Africa and elsewhere, who have had their lives curtailed by the tragic plague of our time.

When Tears Stand Still is available at amazon.

 

Jenes--(possibly December 2010)

Dr. Fred McBagonluri keeps a website here... Also, he has agreed to be interviewed by ImageNations. We would bring him closer to you soon.