William Maz is no stranger to life under the Romanian communist regime. In his international thriller The Bucharest Dossier (read our review here), Maz depicts, in striking detail, the struggles and sacrifices endured by the Romanian people, in addition to the bonds formed and the incredible tenacity displayed in the face of such hardship.
“[Nicolae] Ceausescu’s regime [1967-1989] was the most brutal in the Soviet Union,” he says. “And yet, the people of Romania retained their dignity and sense of humor, their old traditions and their ever-present quest for friendship and love.”
Set in the start of the 1989 uprising in Romania, CIA analyst Bill Hefflin — a disillusioned Romanian expat — arrives in Bucharest at the insistence of his KGB asset, code-named Boris. As Hefflin becomes embroiled in an uprising that turns into a brutal revolution, nothing is as it seems, including the search for his childhood love, which has taken on mythical proportions.
With the bloody events unfolding at blinding speed, Hefflin realizes the revolution is manipulated by outside forces, including his own CIA and Boris — the puppeteer who seems to be pulling all the strings of Hefflin’s life.
In this Q&A, Maz offered further insight into his life and his work.
Q: How have your past experiences informed your writing of this book?
A: I was born in Bucharest to Greek parents during the communist era, and my family was allowed to emigrate when I was young. I have visited Bucharest many times since, both during Ceausescu’s long, brutal regime and immediately before and after the revolution. I speak the language fluently and have relatives and friends who still reside there. As such, I have a good understanding of the Romanian psyche, the terrifying conditions they endured during the communist regime, and the sacrifices they had to make to gain their freedom. I was able to use scenes from my own experiences in Bucharest, both from my childhood and from later extended visits, to deepen and widen the novel.
Q: What caused you to step away from medicine and focus on fiction writing?
A: Writing fiction has always been my passion. I started writing when I was in high school, then took fiction writing classes during college, while in medical school, and later while practicing medicine in New York. I wrote my first novel during my medical school studies, late at night, and later wrote two other novels while working as a physician in New York. The Bucharest Dossier is my first published novel, though it is the fourth novel I have completed. At one point in my medical career, I decided that I could no longer delay my lifelong dream and became a full-time writer. It was the best decision I ever made.
Q: You say you use fiction writing to ask the larger questions of life. Which questions have you posed for us in The Bucharest Dossier?
A: One is love: how real is it, can it survive 20 years of separation, and how does it change? Another is the challenge every immigrant faces when having to adapt to a new society, language and norms. A third is the depiction of life under a brutal totalitarian regime and the moral compromises one makes to survive. A fourth is the depiction of the internal life of a spy, the need to kill, and the moral dilemmas that killing poses. And finally, I wanted to show that life can be magical, even under the worst circumstances.
Q: CIA analyst Bill Hefflin has been described as “a man apart.” What is meant by that?
A: Hefflin is a native of Romania, lived for a year in a refugee camp in Greece, then came to America. He has now turned his back on the immigrant community and changed his name to be accepted as an American. And yet, he misses his native language, his childhood, and his childhood love, and never seems to fit in either among Romanians or Greeks or Americans. He feels like a gypsy, itinerant, temporary, to the point that he never even hangs up pictures on the walls of his apartment. His return to Bucharest promises to challenge him even further.
Q: What was your research process like?
A: I interviewed relatives and friends in Romania, read media accounts both in English and Romanian, read books about the revolution, and studied many Romanian and Western analysts, including those from the State Department and clandestine services.
Q: What makes this book stand out in the crowded field of international thrillers?
A: The Bucharest Dossier is a love story inside a spy thriller inside a historical novel. All three elements are intertwined and equally important. The book tries to accurately depict the lives of the people under that brutal regime from first-hand experiences, the daily grind of standing in lines for food, the corruption and propaganda, and the terror of the Securitate, the ever-present secret police. It accurately follows Ceausescu’s demise and execution and proposes a novel solution to the question of who was behind the revolution. All this while Hefflin tries to find his love and Ceausescu’s offshore accounts, which are rumored to contain billions of stolen dollars.
Q: What appeals to you about the period of the Romanian revolution, and is there anything in particular you were trying to convey in your depiction of it?
A: The Romanian revolution of 1989 is unique in several ways. Romania’s Stalinist regime under Ceausescu was the most brutal of all, even surpassing Russia. By December of 1989, Romania remained as the only European Soviet satellite country that had not shed the shackles of communism. Even the Berlin Wall had fallen by then. And Romania’s transition to democracy was the only one that involved a bloody revolution. To this day, Romanians still ask themselves whether it was a truly popular revolution or a coup instigated by outside forces. I propose a plausible answer.
Unlike the other Soviet satellite states, which all had versions of a “velvet” revolution, Romania’s revolution resulted in anywhere from 1,100 to 2,000 deaths. The true numbers will never be known, since many of the bodies were gathered and incinerated by the government during the mayhem. Ceausescu’s regime was the most brutal in the Soviet Union. And yet, the people of Romania retained their dignity and sense of humor, their old traditions and their ever-present quest for friendship and love. It is a study, both of the resilience of the human spirit and the many ways, both good and bad, in which the people tried to survive.
Q: What is your next project?
A: I am completing the sequel, The Bucharest Legacy, which takes place three years after the revolution.
https://booktrib.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/03/WiliamMaz_authorphoto-1.webp
About William Maz:
Born in Bucharest, Romania, William Maz immigrated to the U.S. as a child. He is a graduate of Harvard University and Mount Sinai School of Medicine. Following a residency in anesthesiology at Yale, he practiced medicine, and during that time, he developed a passion for writing fiction. He studied writing at Harvard, the New School, and The Writer’s Studio in New York City, and is now writing full time. William is married to a surgeon and he divides his time between Pennsylvania and New York City. The Bucharest Dossier is his debut novel.
