Inside the Mind of Thirty Umrigar: The Making of Missing Sam
Novel Suspects: Why did you write this book?
Thirty Umrigar: I was interested in writing a mystery novel with a more diverse cast of characters than one typically sees in this genre. Many of the novels that I have read in recent years where someone disappears featured a white, heterosexual couple and I was interested in “mixing it up”and seeing how the society’s slings and arrows would register if half of the couple, the spouse who comes under suspicion, happens to be brown-skinned and Muslim and gay. I was especially interested in setting the novel in 2019, a fraught and polarizing time, when anonymous online mobs didn’t think twice before attacking someone and casting aspersions on their character and minorities were treated with suspicion and hostility.Missing Sam is essentially a social critique wrapped in a mystery novel.
NS: What do you hope readers get out of this book?
TU: The novel portrays a grim picture of a polarized world, where people are quick to judge those who they know nothing about other than their racial characteristics.And where the victims themselves make one wrong decision after another. But there is also hope and healing and reconciliation that takes place during the most dire of times. So, in some sense, this is also a novelabout our better angels. And more than anything, I hope people understand the role that compassion and being an allymust play during times of crisis.
NS: What was the most difficult aspect of writing this book?
TU: Undoubtedly, writing the chapters that feature George, who is unlike any character I have ever created. It was a truly walking a tightrope—on the one hand, I wanted to make the reader understand just how volatile and unpredictable and crazy he is. But on the other, I also wanted to give an insight into the forces that may have created such a twisted person. What guided me in writing his chapters was a salient belief: My job as a writer is not to excuse my character’s behavior. However, I must always understand it. I wanted the reader to feel the same weird combination of revulsion and pity that I felt toward him.
NS: Why did you set the novel in a real town?
TU: I thought it would lend the novel a degree of authenticity to set it in the real town of Cleveland Heights, which I know well. I was eager to find a place that prides itself on its diversity and liberalism because I wanted to test those values and see whether they would hold up under pressure. Also, it was great fun to name places that I know well and that readers may also recognize.
Discover the Book
Aliya reports her wife missing, but as a gay, Muslim daughter of immigrants, she can’t escape the scrutiny and suspicion of those around her. Scared and furious and feeling isolated as strangers and acquaintances alike doubt her innocence, Aliya makes one wrong choice after another. She must fight to prove her innocence in the public eye even as she is torn between her fear that Sam is dead and her desire to find and save her wife. But is safety ever truly possible for them?
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