The Flight of the Veil received a 4+ star review, making it an IndieReader Approved title.
Following find an interview with author Bruce J. Berger.
What is the name of the book and when was it published?
The Flight of the Veil (October 2020)
What’s the book’s first line?
He moves when ordered, shoots when he must, eats when he can, but feels he no longer inhabits his own body.
What’s the book about? Give us the “pitch”.
Greek siblings separated by the Holocaust rediscover each other after almost five decades and give each other new reasons to live.
What inspired you to write the book? A particular person? An event?
Why, in the midst of the horrors of the Holocaust and war, did some people live while many others perished? Where is God in these events? These questions have always haunted me.
What’s the main reason someone should really read this book?
We need to think about and perhaps hope for miracles in our world today, so this story is for those who want to consider the possibility of miracles.
What’s the most distinctive thing about the main character? Who-real or fictional-would you say the character reminds you of?
Nicky Covo is a Holocaust survivor, yet he suffers from guilt for the killings he was responsible for, including killings of innocent people while he fought as a partisan against the occupying Germans. Perhaps he reminds me a little of the crew of the Enola Gay, which had to drop an atomic bomb on Hiroshima, recognizing that thousands of innocent people would be killed as a result.
If they made your book into a movie, who would you like to see play the main character(s)?
Ralph Fiennes or Timothy Hutton would play Nicky Covo; Penelope Cruz would play Sister Theodora/Kal; Jennifer Gray would play Helen; Meryl Streep would play Abbess Fevronia.
When did you first decide to become an author?
I started writing in high school and never gave it up. But I began to write much more seriously at age 58.
Is this the first book you’ve written?
I have written two earlier novels centering largely around Nicky Covo. Displaced is the novel about the year he immigrated to America following World War II. The Music Stalker (now being rewritten) is about his prodigy daughter, Kayla, who appears also in The Flight of the Veil, and Nicky’s entire family as they deal with Kayla’s incipient schizophrenia.
What do you do for work when you’re not writing?
I’m a retired lawyer, but I have a second career as a writing professor at American University, Washington, DC.
How much time do you generally spend on your writing?
Not enough. Teaching takes an awful lot of time. Say maybe five hours a week right now, but it varies.
What’s the best and the hardest part of being an indie?
I don’t think there’s much difference between being published by a large publisher and an indie. One spends a lot of time on marketing. Period.
What’s a great piece of advice that you can share with fellow indie authors?
I don’t feel qualified to give advice at this point. If my book does well, then maybe.
Would you go traditional if a publisher came calling? If so, why?
I will listen to all offers. A big advance would help me go with a traditional publisher.
Is there something in particular that motivates you (fame? fortune?)
My characters are real to me, and I want their stories to be told, as well as they can be.
Which writer, living or dead, do you most admire?
There are so many great writers. Right at this minute, I’ll say Toni Morrison. I’m thinking particularly of Beloved.
Which book do you wish you could have written?
If by this question, I’m being asked to name my favorite novel, right now I’d say The Brothers Karamazov. But I really would like to have written the sequel that Dostoevsky intended, so I could find out what was supposed to happen.