McELROY, Susan Chernak 1952-

PERSONAL: Born February 28, 1952, in New York, NY; daughter of Julius (a chef) and Hermine (Freiberger) Chernak. Ethnicity: "White." Politics: Democrat. Religion: "Animist." Hobbies and other interests: Baking, gardening, skiing.

ADDRESSES: Home and office—146 Grand Teton Dr., Driggs, ID 83422. Agent—Elaine Markson, Elaine Markson Literary Agency, Inc., 44 Greenwich Ave., New York, NY 10011.

CAREER: Writer. Worked as technical editor and with animals at Marin Humane Society, Humane Society of Sonoma County, Humane Society of Utah, Marin Wildlife Center, and Knowland State Park Baby Zoo, and at kennels, stables, and veterinary clinics.

WRITINGS:

Animals as Teachers and Healers: True Stories and Reflections, Ballantine (New York, NY), 1995.

Animals as Guides for the Soul: Stories of Life-Changing Encounters, Ballantine (New York, NY), 1998.

Heart in the Wild: A Journey of Self-Discovery with Animals of the Wilderness, Ballantine (New York, NY), 2002.

All My Relations: Living with Animals as Teachers and Healers, New World Library (Novato, CA), 2004.

Contributor to books, including foreword to Unforgettable Mutts: Pure of Heart Not of Breed, by Karen Derrico, New Sage Press (Troutdale, OR), 1999; contributor to anthologies, including Intimate Nature: The Bond between Women and Animals, edited by Linda Hogan, Deena Metzger, and Brenda Peterson; Kinship with the Animals, by Michael Tobias and Kate Solisti-Mattelon; Wounded Healers, by Rachael Naomi Remen; and Chicken Soup for Soul Survivors, by Jack Canfield and Mark Hansen. Contributor to periodicals, including Vegetarian Times.

SIDELIGHTS: Susan Chernak McElroy is an animal advocate who writes and lectures about humans' relationships and interdependence with animals. McElroy was born in New York City and spent time at her grandmother's farm in the Catskill Mountains of upper New York state as a child. At home she adopted as many injured squirrels, birds, snakes, turtles, and stray cats and dogs as her parents would allow. Nearly all of her jobs included animal care—as a veterinary assistant, humane educator, zookeeper, dog trainer, stable hand, and wildlife rehabilitator. She also worked as a technical editor for environmental firms, which she feels helped her gain the skills necessary in compiling her work into readable documents.

McElroy was diagnosed with cancer when she was thirty-seven. In fighting her illness she drew on the love and strength of her dog Keesha as well as Flora, a stray kitten she had rescued. McElroy told New Leaf Distributing Company Web Site interviewer Lisa Roggow that, while going through cancer, "I was having a personal transformation of my own, and part of that was coming back to what was important to me in my life truly…. One of these things was how much animals had been my compass, my allies, and my friends…. When I returned to that mentality, I found that there was a lot of healing in that for me." During McElroy's post-medical treatment, she joined a women's group the mission of which was to help each member determine her life's purpose and define the goals necessary to support it. McElroy's mission appears in Animals as Teachers and Healers: True Stories and Reflections: "I will acknowledge the profound and continual role of animals in my life as angels, teachers, and healers. I will repay this special gift by caring for, writing about, and speaking on behalf of animals throughout the course of my life. I will work to heal the relationship between people and animals by fostering an awareness of the sacredness, specialness, and spirituality that is a natural component of the animal kingdom."

McElroy had published one article when she began her first book. She solicited writings from others with stories to tell and was flooded with contributions, which took three years to sort through and condense into Animals as Teachers and Healers. Because she is not an expert, McElroy had reservations about writing the book, but hearing from so many people of like mind empowered her to complete her exploration of the psychological and spiritual bonds between animals and people. A Publishers Weekly reviewer characterized McElroy's "overwhelming message" to her readers as one of "recogniz[ing] our kinship with other species." Judith H. Silverman commented in Kliatt that Animals as Teachers and Healers "will be a little too New Age for some readers, but others will call it a little gem."

A contributor to Publishers Weekly commented that McElroy's second book, Animals as Guides for the Soul: Stories of Life-Changing Encounters, "offers bountiful food for thought and meditation." In this book McElroy explores communication and spirituality between humans and animals and states her belief that animals should coexist with humans on an equal level. Her stories speak to the paths shared by people and animals in spirituality, service, communication, forgiveness, and transformation. A Kirkus Reviews contributor wrote that McElroy "listens to animals closely, she observes their body language … on the lookout for signs and messages using the ancient language of empathy and intuition." Booklist reviewer Nancy Bent said the book "speaks of the warm affirmation of life that is found in relationships with animals."

McElroy once told CA: "When I contracted advanced head and neck cancer at the age of thirty-seven, my 'real work' began: the work of becoming myself in the most complete way I could in the time I had left. Of course, animals were the core of who I was, and had been since my infancy when I lugged around puppies and chickens on my grandmother's Catskill farm. In the initial stages of my cancer diagnosis, I turned my attention to animals in an intense way, and my passion for them helped guide me to a path of healing, writing, and speaking. To say that animals gave me back my life is the basic truth about who I am.

"I always had a small gift for writing and decided to put it to use on behalf of the animals who had come to be such a part of my life and survival. I believe that when you are on your right road, the oceans will part for you. Example: I had a publisher for my first book, Animals as Teachers and Healers, before I had written a dozen pages of manuscript. All along the way, my journey as a writer has been blessed with miracle after miracle. That first book of mine became a New York Times bestseller and went on to be published in fourteen or more countries (I gave up counting).

"I never feel that my writing is my own. I believe that I write what I am given to write. Please forgive me if this sounds like hoogy-moogy. Surviving metastatic cancer has made me a true believer in the intangibles of life—which are the very soul of life. When I am 'on' with my writing, I have no sense that the skill is mine at all, but that it is poured into me from somewhere else. I believe that if I ever begin writing simply for money or to satisfy some publisher, any writing talent I have, beyond stringing a few coherent sentences together, will leave me.

"I don't write each day and am totally undisciplined in my writing process. When I am involved in a writing project, I can write for ten hours a day, pumping out words at a furious pace. Between projects, I might not write at all for months.

"I imagine I will be writing about animals and nature for years to come. However, I feel other topics beginning to call me, as well. Because writing is my tool for serious self-examination, each book idea grows as my life grows. My elderly mother is living with me now, and I would like to explore the nature of that relationship—the connection between adult child and child-like adult—in a future book."

BIOGRAPHICAL AND CRITICAL SOURCES:

PERIODICALS

Booklist, November 1, 1998, Nancy Bent, review of Animals as Guides for the Soul: Stories of Life-Changing Encounters.

Kirkus Reviews, September 15, 1998, review of Animals as Guides for the Soul.

Kliatt, May, 1996, Judith Silverman, review of Animals as Teachers and Healers: True Stories and Reflections, p. 33.

Library Journal, April 15, 1997, p. 139.

Publishers Weekly, January 6, 1997, review of Animals as Teachers and Healers, p. 61; September 21, 1998, review of Animals as Guides for the Soul, p. 36.

ONLINE

New Leaf Distributing Company Web Site, http://www.newleaf-dist.com/ (March 9, 1999), "Chatting with Dave Suechern," interview by Lisa Roggow.

Susan Chernak McElroy Home Page, http://www.susanchernakmcelroy.com (November 6, 2005).