Q&A with Saul Golubcow

 

 

Saul Golubcow is the author of the new novel Who Killed the Rabbi's Wife?. He also has written the book The Cost of Living and Other Mysteries.

 

Q: Why did you return to your character Frank Wolf in this new novel?

 

A: Better than “return,” I believe the answer is because I never left him. About five years ago, I had intended to write “a” story about an elderly Holocaust survivor named Frank Wolf who becomes a private detective in Brooklyn and solves “a” case. It was to be part of a series of short stories about Holocaust survivors who come to the United States.

 

But after publishing the short story version of The Cost of Living, I discovered how much I enjoyed spending time with Frank and his family. And readers asked me when will Frank get a new case.

 

So I continued writing about how he, with his grandson Joel, solves additional mysteries in the 1970s New York Jewish communities. The result was a compilation of three novella-length stories in The Cost of Living and Other Mysteries, released in 2022.

 

Now, two years later, in my novel, Who Killed the Rabbi’s Wife?, Aliya, Joel’s wife, is part of the team.

 

I do, at times, find it difficult to extract myself from the world of Frank Wolf and the 1970s. Everyday life has multitudes of distractions. Added to them is my other life with Frank and Joel and their challenges to which I want to return as soon as possible, often to the disregard of some of those everyday demands. I am too often guilty of a version of daydreaming I call “lost in writing space.”

 

As an aside, in a conversation with a fellow mystery writer, she complimented me on the way I drew the characters of Frank Wolf and his grandson Joel. “But,” she added, “you don’t do much with female characters.”

 

My reaction in that moment was to be defensive, and I stumbled through a lame explanation. But then, I said, “I will give it some thought.” And I did.

 

I admitted to myself that I come out of the boys’ locker room, and I had been more comfortable drawing male characters. I committed myself to challenging myself to get out of that comfort zone and incorporate more central and more involved women. Thus, Aliya joined the team in investigating the murder of her best friend’s mother.

Q: Did you know how the novel would end before you started writing it, or did you make many changes along the way?

 

A: Always a hard question. Yes, because I knew who murdered Batya Flaum from the outset.

 

But since I wished to present, in addition to what I hope is a page-turner plot, reflections on how and why crimes are committed, delivering those thoughts made me change several times character description, interactions, and dialogue until I was satisfied. The novel was two years in the writing, principally due to these revisions.

 

Q: What inspired the plot of Who Killed the Rabbi's Wife?

 

A: As some readers have already asked me, was the 1994 real-life hiring by a New Jersey rabbi of two men to kill his wife the “inspiration” for my novel? 

 

Well, “inspiration” may not be the right word in this case, but yes, it precipitated my thoughts. I had that murder in mind, so I asked myself how could it play out differently if something similar occurred in the Brooklyn Orthodox community of 1975.

 

Because my intent with all of my Frank Wolf mysteries is to write a fully Jewish detective story with extrapolations to the universal, I changed the larger blueprint of the New Jersey murder to wrap clues in Jewish culture, teachings, and locale so, as Frank Wolf explains, the New York City police department is very competent, but there are some crimes that call on specialized knowledge and sensitivities for solving (the New York Jewish communities of the 1970s).

 

Frank makes the point that if a murder occurs in an Amish community, he would not be the right detective to investigate.

 

Q: What do you hope readers take away from the story?

 

A: I would like readers of all ages and backgrounds to take away an understanding of Jewish culture and lessons for living that are extracted from stories about crimes.

 

From a Jewish perspective, what forces within Batya Flaum’s killer led that person to commit the crime? What others in the killer’s community may have been complicit in the murder? What community interactions play in a murder?

 

I also want readers to understand and engage with Joel, the narrator of all of the Frank Wolf mysteries. After all, he is the storyteller from whose eyes everything is conveyed to the reader.

 

I want readers to see the progression of stories as a coming-of-age narrative in which Joel, with the tutelage of his grandfather and support of his wife, Aliya, is growing and better understanding himself. It may not happen, but if my stories take Joel into a much older age, there still will be growth.

 

Q: What are you working on now?

 

A: I’m working on another Frank Wolf novel tentatively called The Holocaust Murder—Prelude and Aftermath. As the child of Holocaust survivors, a voice has been telling me to explore, fictionally, the darkest of forces during the Holocaust that contribute 30 years later to a homicide in Brooklyn.

 

After completing Who Killed the Rabbi’s Wife?, I said to myself: no more excuses. As hard as it’s going to be, write the story that’s been kicking around in my mind. I’m probably a year away from completion.

 

Q: Anything else we should know?

 

A: Only that I love reader comments because they help me improve my writing. So if I may ask, if someone reads my work, would you please write to me at essgees123@gmail.com?

 

Thank you for the opportunity to share some thoughts.

 

--Interview with Deborah Kalb. Here's a previous Q&A with Saul Golubcow.