Rosedale in Love by Lev Raphael

Author: Lev Raphael
Narrator: Robin Siegerman
Length: 11 hours 59 minutes
Publisher: Audiobooks Unleashed⎮2021
Genre: Historical Fiction
Release date: May 20, 2021

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 In the glittering world of money-mad 1905 New York City, Jewish financier Simon Rosedale plans to force his way into high society through marriage, and has his eye on Lily Bart. One of the most beautiful women in the city, Lily is a down-at-heels aristocrat plagued by gossip, and might be vulnerable to his proposal. With his money and her style and connections, he can rise to the top - but will she lower herself to marry a Jew? 
Could such a marriage heal Rosedale's secret shame, and will Florence Goodhart, the cousin who adores Rosedale, help or hinder his plans? 
Written in a period voice, Rosedale in Love audaciously revisions Edith Wharton's beloved classic The House of Mirth, offering listeners a timeless American story of greed, envy, scandal, love, and revenge.
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About the Author: Lev Raphael
Lev Raphael is the author of 27 books in genres from memoir to mystery and a winner of a Lambda Book Award for his first collection of short stories.   He has twenty years of university teaching behind him, most recently at Michigan State University, whose Library has purchased his literary papers and updates the archive yearly.  His work has been translated into 15 languages and has appeared on course syllabi around the country--which means he's been homework.  Edith Wharton inspired him to become a writer and he's published a book about her life and fiction as well as a comic mystery: The Edith Wharton Murders. A frequent traveler to Germany, Lev studies both German and Swedish as a hobby and takes voice lessons too. He is the proud owner of two West Highland White Terriers and has lived in Michigan with his partner for more than thirty years.
Website⎮Twitter⎮Facebook


About the Narrator: Robin Siegerman
I trained in NYC with acting coach William Esper, Speech and dialect coach Timothy Monich and vocal coach Albert Hague. Improv at Second City Toronto, and audiobook coaching with Sean Pratt, Joel Froomkin and Dawn Harvey. 
In 2018 I was nominated for Best International Voiceover at the One Voice Awards in London, England, for the documentary voiceover in www.HarrysStory.ca . In 2019 I won Best Corporate Training Voice Over Artist by CV Magazine and in 2021 won an Earphones Award from AudioFile magazine for A Son at the Front, by Edith Wharton.
I grew up in Montreal speaking English and French, so developed an ear for language and accents at an early age. However, after two years of speech training,  my natural speaking voice is neutral American, and I have a wide variety of accents to draw upon for audiobook narration: English & French Canadian, Classic French, German, American Southern, New York, Italian, Irish, German, English RP and Estuary.
With an additional background as an international award-winning interior designer, author of Renovation Bootcamp®: Kitchen and conference speaker, I love to “make movies for the ears”.
In my spare time, you can find me surrounded by a bevvy of rescue dogs, singing with my a capella ensemble SoundCrowd in Toronto, or playing board games with my husband Steve, our son Julian and daughter-in-law Danielle. 
Website⎮Twitter⎮Facebook⎮Instagram

Interview with Lev Raphael

• What made you decide to write this book?
  

Reading Wharton in college helped deepen my fiction writing and I felt a kinship of sorts.  As the son of immigrants I wasn't remotely like an Old New York aristocrat, but The Gilded Age was around me when I was growing up.  I lived in a building constructed in 1900 and my local library was built by Stanford White's architectural firm.  Once I discovered Wharton, I read everything of hers that was in print. Like many people of her time and class, she had some blind spots including how she perceived Jews.  I loved The House of Mirth despite how the financier Simon Rosedale is portrayed and after many readings of that book over the years, I decided to rewrite the story from his point of view.

• What appealed to you about the period?
  

It was a time of almost unimaginable excess for New York's millionaires around clothes, carriages, mansions, jewels, weddings, yachts.  It was also a period when the kind of celebrity coverage we see all across media now was starting to take hold.  Wealthy Americans actually hired people to handle their publicity, and their events and lives were shared in brand new ways in newspapers.  This makes great material for fiction.

• Was a possible audiobook recording something you were conscious of while writing? 
  

No, but the sound of the book was important to me.  In the two years I researched the Gilded Age, after many dozens of books about the period, I focused on books written in the period, fiction and nonfiction.  I wanted to hear as many voices from that time as possible, especially ones I didn't know, like books teaching people manners and a 1900 guide for women seeking employment.  

• Were there any real life inspirations behind your writing? 
  

I was inspired by Edith Wharton herself, by her life and her fearless, beautifully-realized, wildly entertaining fiction that's as relevant today as it was when she was writing.  Nobody expected or wanted her to be a writer: she was supposed to just marry and be a society wife.   What she says about the constraints on women's freedom resonated for me as well as her stunning insights into the power of shame to shape someone's life.

• How do you manage to avoid burn-out? What do you do to maintain your enthusiasm for writing?
  

I've published 27 books and hundreds of short stories, essays, book reviews and blogs.  But I also have a full life outside of writing which balances everything.  I love to travel, I love studying languages, I love art, music, cooking.   I don't really burn out—I pace myself and enjoy not writing as much as writing.  I'm also a writing coach and editor at writewithoutborders.com and have the joy of passing on the terrific mentoring I got in college from the creative writing professor I'm still in touch with.

• Are you an audiobook listener? What about the audiobook format appeals to you? 
  

Audiobooks are as important and convenient for readers as ebooks are when it comes to travel.  You can't always find the time to sit down and read a physical book, and audiobooks bring rich, stirring voices into your life: there's the book itself and then of course the narrator which takes the writing to a whole new level.

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