Where are they now? – Pipestone County Star

Pipestone County native, Sarah Fjellanger, with her recently published book,
“Last Chance Stop.” Fjellanger, who
currently lives in Savage, is working on a sequel to her book and a children’s book.
Contributed photo

Born and raised in Pipestone County, Sarah Fjellanger graduated from Pipestone High School in 1965. Shortly after graduating, Fjellanger married and moved to the Twin Cities where her husband had a job working for Minnesota AAA. The couple has three daughters, and when the youngest was in middle school, Fjellanger began working in the insurance industry, eventually starting her own agency in Prior Lake. After 15 years of running her business, she decided to sell the agency to another, although she continued to work for them specializing in insuring associations such as townhomes, condos and senior living facilities. After 40 years of working in the insurance industry, Fjellanger retired in 2014. However, her professional journey was not yet over. Prior to beginning her retirement, Fjellanger, who now resides in Savage, decided to go back to school.

“When I was older, (55) I decided to go to college, not to obtain a specific degree, but only because I loved learning,” she said. “I soon rediscovered my love of reading and writing and from there followed the path to graduate with a four-year degree in creative writing.”

Fjellanger took one or two classes each semester at Metropolitan State University while she was still working full-time, and received her degree at the age of 71. One of the courses she took inspired her to write her first book, Fjellanger said.

“One of the classes I took was called 1000 words or less,” she said. “For one of my assignments, I wrote a story about a very young girl sitting inside a box car on a train. She was an orphan and all alone. When my professor returned the paper to me, she told me “This will never do.” I asked what I had done wrong, and she smiled, then said, “It needs to be a book.” So it was that professor, now a friend, who encouraged me to go through the hard work of learning to write a book.”

Fjellanger began working with her publisher in January of this year, and in October, it was published and released on Amazon and Ingram. The book, titled “Last Chance Stop,” is a work of historical fiction that takes place in the year 1900 and is about a young family of immigrants from Norway, she said.

“Their twelve-year-old daughter, Kristi, yearns to be a teacher and is worried that going to America will end that dream,” she said. “Her dad, on the other hand, wants a farm where the crops don’t die because of worms. You, the reader, will discover the problems surrounding immigration, the effects of the industrial revolution, the results of too many people in too little space (disease and death) and the desperation of children orphaned on the streets of New York. You will follow Kristi all the way to Minnesota where she settles in Pipestone City, a small prairie town.”
Seeing her first book published was an amazing feeling, Fjellanger said.

“After many years of working on the story, it was a thrill to see it in print and feel it in my hands,” she said.

Her days of writing are far from over, Fjellanger said, as she is currently working on a sequel to the book as well as a children’s book written in the format of C.S. Lewis’s “The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe.”

Anyone interested in reading Fjellanger’s recently released book can purchase it on Amazon or Ingram, and all are welcome to connect with her to receive a signed copy, or to invite her to speak at their book club or other literary events where her book is also available to purchase.