Searching for Wallenberg: A Novel - Hardcover

The world remembers Raoul Wallenberg as the Swedish diplomat who saved thousands of Jews in Budapest in 1944-45, and was subsequently arrested by the Soviets in 1945, and taken to Moscow where he disappeared until his apparent death. Now, more than 65 years after these events, many mysteries about Wallenberg’s life and fate persist.

SEARCHING FOR WALLENBERG by the critically acclaimed novelist, Alan Lelchuk explores the mysteries still surrounding Wallenberg. How and when did he die? Did he perhaps survive in some Gulag camp or psychiatric hospital? Why did he languish in a Soviet prison from 1945-1947 without being exchanged by the Swedish government as other political prisoners in Europe were--or rescued by his very wealthy and well-connected family in Stockholm?

Lelchuk meditates on these enduring mysteries and tries to imagine, with the scanty historical evidence, what might have really happened. During his writing of the novel Lelchuk engaged in wide research including travels to Stockholm, Budapest, and Moscow, where he interviewed historians, read documents and archives and visited physical sites. He also met with some of the few remaining witnesses, officials and participants including, most significantly, Wallenberg’s KGB interrogator (Daniel Pagliansky) in Lybianka Prison in 1945-47 the first and only Westerner to interview this key character.

In SEARCHING FOR WALLENBERG, after reading a graduate student’s thesis about the fate of Raoul Wallenberg, Professor Manny Gellerman grows interested, and begins to travel the unorthodox paths of the mysterious tale. Gradually he discovers some uncomfortable truths of what happened to the gentleman who was abandoned by his family and by his country, to fester in Lybianka prison for two whole years. Along his journey, the Professor encounters a strange woman in Budapest who calls herself Zsuzsanna Wallenberg, and claims that Raoul Wallenberg was her father. More and more, as Gellerman digs deeper he realizes that the biggest mystery was Wallenberg himself.

At once a literary detective story, a historical investigation, and a tale of an unusual friendship, SEARCHING FOR WALLENBERG provides a compelling experience for the reader, one filled with multiple layers of feeling, surprising characters, scenes of intense drama and moments of lyrical revelation.

Alan Lelchuk is a novelist and professor, who was born and grew up in Brooklyn, New York. He received his B.A. in World Literature from Brooklyn College in 1960, studied at University College (London) in 1962-63, and received his M.A.in 1963 and Ph.D. in 1965, both in English from Stanford University. His critically acclaimed novels are American Mischief, Miriam at Thirty-Four, Shrinking: The Beginning of My Own Ending, Miriam in Her Forties, Brooklyn Boy, Playing the Game, Searching for Wallenberg, and Ziff: A Life? He co-edited 8 Great Hebrew Short Novels and has written, for young adults, On Home Ground. He is a co-founder of Steerforth Press, has taught at Brandeis University and Amherst College, and since 1985 has been on the faculty of Dartmouth College in New Hampshire.
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The world remembers Raoul Wallenberg as the Swedish diplomat who saved thousands of Jews in Budapest in 1944-45, and was subsequently arrested by the Soviets in 1945, and taken to Moscow where he disappeared until his apparent death. Now, more than 65 years after these events, many mysteries about Wallenberg’s life and fate persist.

SEARCHING FOR WALLENBERG by the critically acclaimed novelist, Alan Lelchuk explores the mysteries still surrounding Wallenberg. How and when did he die? Did he perhaps survive in some Gulag camp or psychiatric hospital? Why did he languish in a Soviet prison from 1945-1947 without being exchanged by the Swedish government―as other political prisoners in Europe were--or rescued by his very wealthy and well-connected family in Stockholm?

Lelchuk meditates on these enduring mysteries and tries to imagine, with the scanty historical evidence, what might have really happened. During his writing of the novel Lelchuk engaged in wide research including travels to Stockholm, Budapest, and Moscow, where he interviewed historians, read documents and archives and visited physical sites. He also met with some of the few remaining witnesses, officials and participants including, most significantly, Wallenberg’s KGB interrogator (Daniel Pagliansky) in Lybianka Prison in 1945-47―the first and only Westerner to interview this key character.

In SEARCHING FOR WALLENBERG, after reading a graduate student’s thesis about the fate of Raoul Wallenberg, Professor Manny Gellerman grows interested, and begins to travel the unorthodox paths of the mysterious tale. Gradually he discovers some uncomfortable truths of what happened to the gentleman who was abandoned by his family and by his country, to fester in Lybianka prison for two whole years. Along his journey, the Professor encounters a strange woman in Budapest who calls herself Zsuzsanna Wallenberg, and claims that Raoul Wallenberg was her father. More and more, as Gellerman digs deeper he realizes that the biggest mystery was Wallenberg himself.

At once a literary detective story, a historical investigation, and a tale of an unusual friendship, SEARCHING FOR WALLENBERG provides a compelling experience for the reader, one filled with multiple layers of feeling, surprising characters, scenes of intense drama and moments of lyrical revelation.

Alan Lelchuk is a novelist and professor, who was born and grew up in Brooklyn, New York. He received his B.A. in World Literature from Brooklyn College in 1960, studied at University College (London) in 1962-63, and received his M.A.in 1963 and Ph.D. in 1965, both in English from Stanford University. His critically acclaimed novels are American Mischief, Miriam at Thirty-Four, Shrinking: The Beginning of My Own Ending, Miriam in Her Forties, Brooklyn Boy, Playing the Game, Searching for Wallenberg, and Ziff: A Life? He co-edited 8 Great Hebrew Short Novels and has written, for young adults, On Home Ground. He is a co-founder of Steerforth Press, has taught at Brandeis University and Amherst College, and since 1985 has been on the faculty of Dartmouth College in New Hampshire.
|Yad Vashem, Jerusalem’s memorial to the six million Jews murdered by the Nazis during World War II, also recognizes non-Jewish individuals who risked their lives to save the Jews from the Nazi executioners. One of the trees that line the memorial’s Avenue of the Righteous” was planted to honor Raoul Wallenberg, a Swede. Among the bravest heroes of World War II, he saved about 100,000 Jews.

But when the war ended, Wallenberg did not return home to well-earned acclaim. Instead he was arrested by the Soviet troops who marched into Budapest. The Soviet government has declared time and again that he is dead. And, just as often, new witnesses have insisted that Raoul Wallenberg is--or was--still alive in a Soviet prison or a mental hospital.

For over seventy years his fate has remained a mystery, and that mystery is the subject of Alan Lelchuk’s novel, Searching for Wallenberg--at once a detective story and an unusual, multilayered love story, with surprising characters, daring plunges into the gaps of history, and an engaging narrative. Here history is enhanced and challenged by fiction

Searching for Wallenberg uses a fictional investigation to explore the real question of what happened. This is a thoughtful and compelling novel that blends mystery, history, and speculative elements and one that will hopefully introduce more readers to an important and often overlooked hero.” Foreword Magazine, May 27, 2015.

Part detective story, part philosophic inquiry, part historic revisionism, Alan Lelchuk delivers a thinking man’s thriller .” Jules Feiffer, Pulitzer Prize and Oscar-winning cartoonist and author

"Searching for Wallenberg offers a fictional account of Wallenberg’s life . . . which is more illuminating than any history we have or may ever get ..The hybrid genre of fiction intertwined with nonfictional aspects is increasingly more common, and with the insertion of the real life interview with [Wallenberg's KGB interrogator] into the fictional narrative, Lelchuk blazes an intriguingly sophisticated and new literary trail." Louis Gordon, Tikkun

"Through the figure of Manny Gellerman, Lelchuk becomes Wallenberg’s faithful ghostwriter”; in the process, Searching for Wallenberg brings Raoul back to life, reimagined for a generation short on memory, short on authentic heroes .The novel may be as close to the truth” about Wallenberg and why we need to keep his memory alive as we are likely to have. Thanks to Lelchuk, Wallenberg’s ethical example continues to move us with admiration and awe.” Donald Weber, Jewish Book Council

Alan Lelchuk, author of the critically acclaimed novels American Mischief, Miriam at Thirty-Four, Shrinking: The Beginning of My Own Ending, Miriam in Her Forties, Brooklyn Boy, Playing the Game, Ziff: A Life? and the recent memoir and biography, Breaking Ground: How Jackie Robinson Changed Brooklyn, has been on the faculty of Dartmouth College in New Hampshire since 1985.
Praise for Alan Lelchuk Earlier Books

Breaking Ground: How Jackie Robinson Changed Brooklyn

Many are familiar with Robinson’s baseball career and cultural impact, but Lelchuk gives insight into the hope Robinson brought specifically to Brooklyn, particularly to immigrant families. While this book will catch the eye of sports fans and Robinson fans, its reach is far greater. It shows how one man changed the racial climate of a troubled borough during a trying era. But it also shows Robinson’s effect on one household and one young boy .Breaking Ground is a mentally and emotionally moving tribute to Jackie Robinson.” Foreword Reviews August 31, 2015

The book offers personal insights detailing how Jackie Robinson not only changed baseball but also the Borough of Churches .The descriptions, the details, the new awarenesses provided, makes this a book to treasure. HIGHLY RECOMMENDED.” Harvey Frommer, author of 42 Sports books including New York City Baseball, 1947-1957 and Shoeless Joe and Ragtime Baseball, in SportsBookShelf of the EPOCH TIMES, November 1, 2015
American Mischief (Book of the Month Main Selection)

Should be read as a companion piece, if not the equal, to Mr. Sammler’s planet.” Mordecai Richler

No novelist has written with such knowledge and eloquence of theconsequences of carnal passion in Massachusetts since NathanielHawthorne.” Philip Roth, Esquire

Miriam at Thirty-Four

The best embodiment we have of the illusions, the risks, the rewards of a woman’s all-out pursuit of herself.” Anatole Broyard, The New York Times

A writer of intelligence, sexual sensibility, and drive.” Samuel Shem, The New York Times Book Review

Swift and Clear-headed, a serious book about serious things.” --Benjamin Demott, The Atlantic Monthly
Brooklyn Boy

Mr. Lelchuk’s contemporaries will be delighted with the full accounting he gives of the home turf.” Saul Bellow

Rich in detail a very engaging novel The sort of book we all want to write.” Wallace Stegner

Yad Vashem, Jerusalem’s memorial to the six million Jews murdered by the Nazis during World War II, also recognizes non-Jewish individuals who risked their lives to save the Jews from the Nazi executioners. One of the trees that line the memorial’s “Avenue of the Righteous” was planted to honor Raoul Wallenberg, a Swede. Among the bravest heroes of World War II, he saved about 100,000 Jews.

But when the war ended, Wallenberg did not return home to well-earned acclaim. Instead he was arrested by the Soviet troops who marched into Budapest. The Soviet government has declared time and again that he is dead. And, just as often, new witnesses have insisted that Raoul Wallenberg is--or was--still alive in a Soviet prison or a mental hospital.

For over seventy years his fate has remained a mystery, and that mystery is the subject of Alan Lelchuk’s novel, Searching for Wallenberg--at once a detective story and an unusual, multilayered love story, with surprising characters, daring plunges into the gaps of history, and an engaging narrative. Here history is enhanced and challenged by fiction

“Searching for Wallenberg uses a fictional investigation to explore the real question of what happened. This is a thoughtful and compelling novel that blends mystery, history, and speculative elements...and one that will hopefully introduce more readers to an important and often overlooked hero.”― Foreword Magazine, May 27, 2015.

“Part detective story, part philosophic inquiry, part historic revisionism, Alan Lelchuk delivers a thinking man’s thriller....”― Jules Feiffer, Pulitzer Prize and Oscar-winning cartoonist and author

"Searching for Wallenberg offers a fictional account of Wallenberg’s life . . . which is more illuminating than any history we have or may ever get.....The hybrid genre of fiction intertwined with nonfictional aspects is increasingly more common, and with the insertion of the real life interview with [Wallenberg's KGB interrogator] into the fictional narrative, Lelchuk blazes an intriguingly sophisticated and new literary trail."―Louis Gordon, Tikkun

"Through the figure of Manny Gellerman, Lelchuk becomes Wallenberg’s faithful “ghostwriter”; in the process, Searching for Wallenberg brings Raoul back to life, reimagined for a generation short on memory, short on authentic heroes....The novel may be as close to the “truth” about Wallenberg and why we need to keep his memory alive as we are likely to have. Thanks to Lelchuk, Wallenberg’s ethical example continues to move us with admiration and awe.”― Donald Weber, Jewish Book Council

Alan Lelchuk, author of the critically acclaimed novels American Mischief, Miriam at Thirty-Four, Shrinking: The Beginning of My Own Ending, Miriam in Her Forties, Brooklyn Boy, Playing the Game, Ziff: A Life? and the recent memoir and biography, Breaking Ground: How Jackie Robinson Changed Brooklyn, has been on the faculty of Dartmouth College in New Hampshire since 1985.
Praise for Alan Lelchuk Earlier Books

Breaking Ground: How Jackie Robinson Changed Brooklyn

“Many are familiar with Robinson’s baseball career and cultural impact, but Lelchuk gives insight into the hope Robinson brought specifically to Brooklyn, particularly to immigrant families. While this book will catch the eye of sports fans and Robinson fans, its reach is far greater. It shows how one man changed the racial climate of a troubled borough during a trying era. But it also shows Robinson’s effect on one household and one young boy....Breaking Ground is a mentally and emotionally moving tribute to Jackie Robinson.” Foreword Reviews August 31, 2015

“The book offers personal insights detailing how Jackie Robinson not only changed baseball but also the Borough of Churches....The descriptions, the details, the new awarenesses provided, makes this a book to treasure. HIGHLY RECOMMENDED.” Harvey Frommer, author of 42 Sports books including New York City Baseball, 1947-1957 and Shoeless Joe and Ragtime Baseball, in SportsBookShelf of the EPOCH TIMES, November 1, 2015
American Mischief (Book of the Month Main Selection)

“Should be read as a companion piece, if not the equal, to Mr. Sammler’s planet.” ―Mordecai Richler

“No novelist has written with such knowledge and eloquence of theconsequences of carnal passion in Massachusetts since NathanielHawthorne.”―Philip Roth, Esquire

Miriam at Thirty-Four

“The best embodiment we have of the illusions, the risks, the rewards of a woman’s all-out pursuit of herself.”―Anatole Broyard, The New York Times

“A writer of intelligence, sexual sensibility, and drive.”―Samuel Shem, The New York Times Book Review

“Swift and Clear-headed, a serious book about serious things.” --Benjamin Demott, The Atlantic Monthly
Brooklyn Boy

“Mr. Lelchuk’s contemporaries will be delighted with the full accounting he gives of the home turf.”―Saul Bellow

“Rich in detail...a very engaging novel...The sort of book we all want to write.”―Wallace Stegner