Galina Vromen
Author Interview - Galina Vromen
Author of Hill of Secrets
When Robert Oppenheimer gathers a group of scientists at the clandestine desert outpost of Los Alamos in 1943 to create the world’s first nuclear weapon, their families move there as well with no explanation other than to “Stand by. Make do. And above all, don’t ask questions.”
Christine Sharp, forced to abandon her art restoration business in New York to support her husband’s career, struggles to reinvent herself.
She meets and forges an unlikely friendship with Gertie, the precocious teenage daughter of German-Jewish refugee and prominent physicist Kurt Koppel. Gertie enlists Christine to help her capture the heart of Jimmy, a shy soldier, and to deal with parents haunted by their past.
Kurt, anguished by what the Nazis have done to his family and bent on defeating them, carries burdens he longs to share but cannot confide in his wife ― leading him to find comfort elsewhere.
In this immersive novel of suppressed yearning, irrepressible love and wracking guilt, the lives of fictional characters intertwine with real-life figures. Like Oppenheimer and his team, they must contend with the moral questions and aftermath of creating the bomb that destroyed Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
Author Interview - Galina Vromen
Author I draw inspiration from:
Kelly Rimmer, author of The German Wife
Author Interview - Galina Vromen | Author I Draw Inspiration From
Favorite place to read a book:
in bed early in the morning
Book character I’d like to be stuck in an elevator with:
The Cat in the Hat from book by the same name by Dr. Seuss. He'd be fun to hang out, probably push all the buttons on the elevator and make things happen on each floor and then deal with me, VROOMING away 20 excess pounds, especially those cottage cheese ripples on my upper arms, and all my various aches and pains!
Author Interview - Galina Vromen | Book Character I’d Like to be Stuck in an Elevator With
The moment I knew I wanted to become an author:
As far back as I can remember. It started by exchanging poems with my grandfather when I was about eight-years-old. I sent him a poem and he sent me one back, and we kept going. I eventually became a journalist which is great training for becoming an author.
Hardback, paperback, ebook or audiobook:
Hardbacks feel eternal but they are uncomfortable to hold. Paperbacks feel nice and are more comfortable but the font is not adjustable. E-books are great. You can adjust the font, you can read at night without disturbing a partner who wants the light off, you can highlight the parts you like and keep those highlights in an organized fashion, and if you move often or travel a lot (as I do) you don't have to pack up a lot of books and your whole library is always with you. The disadvantage is that I forget the title of books because you don't see the title every time you pick up the book. Audiobooks are great for long commutes, but not for books I really want to concentrate on because, after all, one has to pay attention to the road as well, so my full attention is not on the book as it is with print.
The last book I read:
Eastbound by Maylis De Kerangal. A totally beautiful book, very lyrical and evocative. She has an inimitable style, almost like poetry that takes my breath away. The book is about a desperate Russian conscript riding with his unit on a trans-Siberian train who tries to desert and hopes a chance encounter with a French woman on the train will offer him an escape. IF you ever wanted to know what it feels like to be a soldier forced to serve who only wishes to get away from it all, this is a book that gets to the core of that desperate experience. She is a French writer and I picked it up Eastbound because I loved a previous book of hers, The Heart, published in 2014, focuses on the transplantation of the heart of a 19-year-old girl and how it affects those involved in the process, including her parents, the physicians, the nurses, the organ transplant coordinators, the recipient, and the recipient's family, over the course of twenty-four hours. Talk about an unusual theme and plot! She's amazing, always surprises.
Author Interview - Galina Vromen | The Last Book I Read
Pen & paper or computer:
Computer always. I have terrible handwriting, which I can barely decipher myself, and from my training as a journalist, and years of typing what people were saying, I type at the speed people talk and pretty much also at the speed at which I think. For me, a computer keyboard feels like my piano, so I feel like I am improvising with my stream of thoughts and then afterwards I edit it all and turn it into something coherent.
Book character I think I’d be best friends with:
Sadie Green from Gabrielle Zevin's book Tomorrow and Tomorrow and Tomorrow. I think she has a deep sense of the essential nature of friendship in that it changes and evolves, so that one can be a friend, a lover, a business partner, and then a friend or lover again at different stages of the friendship. I look at relationships that way -- or at least aspire to. She is also very creative, but as a computer game designer, she is creative in a very different way than I am (I have never actually played a complex computer game) so I would love to explore with her the differences between creating games and writing books and I believe we would have lots of interesting conversations. Furthermore, she is very kind and insightful person and I would enjoy that aspect of her.
Author Interview - Galina Vromen | Book Character I’d be Best Friends With
If I weren’t an author, I’d be a:
an English teacher, particular English-as-a-second-language. I am in love with the English language and I love exploring the nuances of the language with people who speak different languages and conveying my love of English to others. I speak 4 other languages (French, Spanish, Dutch and Hebrew) and it always intrigues me to see what expressions exist in one language and not in others, the quirks of each language.
Favorite decade in fashion history:
Flapper of the 1920s. The flappers defied convention, represented a freer womanhood, who were sexually freer, favored what was then the latest in music -- jazz.
Place I’d most like to travel:
Patagonia -- for the nature
My signature drink:
seltzer with pomegranate juice
Favorite artist:
John Batiste
Number one on my bucket list:
Go on an Africa Safari
Find more from the author:
www.galinavromen.com
abigailglasspr for instagram
About Galina Vromen:
Author Interview - Galina Vromen
I began writing fiction after more than twenty years as an international journalist in Israel, England, the Netherlands, France, and Mexico.
After a career with Reuters News Agency, I moved into the nonprofit sector as a director at the Harold Grinspoon Foundation. I launched and directed two reading readiness programs in Israel, one in Hebrew (Sifriyat Pijama) and one in Arabic (Maktabat al-Fanoos). During my tenure, the two programs gifted twenty million books to young children and their families and were named US Library of Congress honorees for best practices in promoting literacy. (For details see the My Other Life page.)
My fiction has been performed on NPR’s Selected Shorts program and appeared in magazines such as American Way, the Adirondack Review, Tikkun, and Reform Judaism. Hill of Secrets is my first full-length novel (it took me 12 years to write it!). I have an MA in literature from Bar-Ilan University in Israel and a BA in media and anthropology from Hampshire College in Massachusetts.
