Q&A with Janis M. Falk

 

 

 

Janis M. Falk is the author of the new novel Not Yet Lost. She lives in Door County, Wisconsin. 

 

Q: What inspired you to write Not Yet Lost, and how did you create your characters Florence and Basia?

 

A: I stumbled upon the story of the cigar factory workers while conducting genealogy research. My father died quite young and I was trying to get a sense of how he grew up in the Poletown neighborhood of Detroit. Combining that with other ideas which had been simmering in my mind for years, I had a story.

 

There’s so much about Detroit that people don’t know. Detroit was the mechanical version of Silicon Valley in the early 20th century. It was the center for innovation and culture, attracting immigrants from all over the world. When the Depression hit, the fall was much harder for Detroit.

 

Also, I wanted to showcase Eastern European immigrants. Poles and other Eastern European immigrants are not the ethnic groups Americans are most familiar with.

 

Florence’s circumstances are modeled after my paternal grandmother, whom I never knew. She was a well-educated Polish/French Canadian woman from Montreal with aspirations of being an artist. I assigned my mother’s personality traits to her.

 

Basia I styled after my godmother who was Slovenian, but I put her into the context of coming from northeast Poland.

 

I think most writers start with someone they know and let their imaginations run wild.

 

Q: How much was the novel inspired by family history, and what did you see as the right balance between history and fiction?

 

A: Even though Not Yet Lost is fiction, most of the events are factual. History is more interesting when presented as a story since, as everyday people, we relate to everyday people, rather than dates or politicians.

 

The circumstances of the characters are real; I imagined what their life in those circumstances would be like to craft the daily activities and conversations.

 

Q: How was the novel’s title chosen, and what does it signify for you?

 

A: I’d had a different working title, Up In Smoke, which signified what often happened to immigrants’ dreams. My publisher wisely pointed out how overused that title was.

 

Not Yet Lost is a phrase from the Polish national anthem and refers to Poland still standing no matter how many times others try to conquer it or tear it apart. There is a scene in the novel where the women dance to the song to remember and honor their heritage.

 

Q: How did you research the book, and what did you learn that especially surprised you?

 

A: A lot of the information was internalized already from stories from my mother and my in-laws. Otherwise, I used all the usual suspects of research; books, the internet, historical societies, movies, and doctoral theses.

 

Also, I traveled to Poland in 1989 before the wall came down. I saw what life was like there and experienced firsthand the perils of living in a country smashed between Germany and Russia.

 

The most surprising? Imagine this. I was reading a book about a secret right-wing society that had spies in factories to report on labor organizing activities. I turned the page and my uncle’s name was at the top! At least he was only an uncle by marriage, and my aunt had divorced him in short order.

 

Q: What are you working on now?

 

A: I’m working on a multi-generational saga that involves a romance between an American man and a young German woman whose grandparents fought each other in World War II. It’s a modern-day Romeo and Juliet story with more fleshed out historical context. The intent is to portray the subtle, yet long lasting, effects of war.

 

Q: Anything else we should know?

 

A: The themes running through Not Yet Lost are  still relevant today. Sometimes, with historical fiction, we can see with a clarity of distance what we can’t in our present day lives.

 

Almost 100 years after the events of Not Yet Lost, the world still grapples with disdain for the working class, xenophobia, and enjoying our lives on the backs of immigrant labor, and not just in America. I could provide many examples, but I think we all read about them.

 

--Interview with Deborah Kalb