Lev RaphaelReseñas

First off, I really enjoyed this book. I always find it interesting to see a story from another character's point of view, and Raphael did a wonderful job of showing us Edith Wharton's classic from Rosedale's POV. The style was kept true to the time period, and made this all the more enjoyable. Siegerman did an excellent job narrating, bringing the story to life. I loved the range used to turn both characters and events into a captivating listen. Overall, I would recommend this to anyone who loves the classics, and I definitely think the story was enhanced by the audio. A must-listen!

What a spoof - of writing and publishing, and academics and academic life! Lots of references to literature - Raphael has a PhD in the subject. Throw in a gay couple, a scattering of lesbians and a conservative preacher. It's a funny and quick read.

An interesting, well-written look of the son of Holocaust survivors who goes to Germany on an author's tour. He must confront his mixed feelings about the country that so forever altered his life.

Dancing on Tisha B'av is a collection of short stories about being gay and Jewish. It was published in 1990, but many of the stories were published before then, in the 1980s. There is a lot of talk about AIDS, which makes sense considering it was a prominent fear at that time. A few of the stories feature men who are proudly, happily gay but stuck in relationships with closet cases. "Betrayed by David Bowie" was a good one (oh, but it made me sick). There are some stories having less to do with homosexuality and more to do with the Jewish family unit. I appreciated the female characters - the strong, beautiful sisters and the mothers who were Holocaust survivors. They never seemed shrill or stereotypical, and their concerns were given as much weight as those by the male characters. I was expecting all the stories to be from the POV of gay men, but they weren't. The author did quite a good job with characterization and story-telling. Each chapter was unique. Good job!

Summary: This book explains what self-esteem is and why kids need it. It also provides real-life examples, along with tips and tools, to help children learn positive ways to deal with their feelings and be confident inside.

Reflection: This book is a excellent resource for children on building self-esteem and learning how to be more assertive. It isn't geared towards just bullying--it also talks about getting teased and put-down by peers, siblings, and even parents. Additionally, this would be a great book to read with students and talk together about the examples, concepts, and activities.

I'd give it 3.5 stars if I could. I'll definitely check out the sequel. I liked Lev Raphael's easy-to-read writing style (even if I didn't always get all the literary references).

16 of 75 for 2015. Most of what I know about Judaism I learned from reading Lev Raphael. His collection of stories Dancing on Tisha B'Av came out in 1990, and it must have been that year I read it. I've since read most of his work, skipping only the children's books and the psychology works he co-authored with his partner Gershen Kaufman. Secret Anniversaries of the Heart came out in 2006, and I may have read it then, but when I found it on my shelves last week, I pulled it down to (re)read it. Some of the stories were very familiar, others seemed new to me, but all were engaging, well told, and thought provoking. Many of the stories involve the children of Holocaust survivors growing up in the United States--a place their parents find extremely foreign. Many of the stories are centered on gay men who are trying to reconcile their sexuality with their religion. All involve the struggle of faith with modern American life. Secret Anniversaries is divided into three sections. The final section is a group of five stories starting with the original Dancing on Tisha B'Av and then building from that story--more deeply probing the life of Nat, Mark, Brenda and their parents. This alone would have made the collection valuable to me, but the twenty stories in the first two sections are outstanding in themselves. As a gay man, I can relate to the homosexuality of the characters, if not their religion. As a student of World War II in Europe, I appreciate the stories of the Holocaust survivors--as much as we learn from these people who in Raphael's world are mostly closed off and silent about the past. These are stories I will read again and again, never tiring of Raphael's prose. I recommend the book to anyone sincerely interested in the humanity of the "other" whether the other be a Lithuanian immigrant, an Orthodox Jew, a gay man. My quibble with this edition is that at times it feels as if the book was proof-read by word check: "gay" becomes "gap," "know" becomes "no." This happens all too frequently and is disappointing in a book by an author as accomplished as Lev Raphael. That said, by all means, read this book! And anything else you find of Raphael's. You won't be disappointed.

An excellent little collection of essays and reviews, by a writer who doesn't limit either his writing or his reading to one genre. I especially liked his essay on "Shakespeare Deniers" in which he demolishes the silliness of barious people who think someone else wrote Shakespeare's plays and sonnets. I was also happy to be reminded of a book I had really enjoyed (Frederic Morton's A Nervous Splendor) and to learn that Morton had written another book about old Vienna. Recommended.

Hvis jeg får lånt denne boka fra amazon lending library kommer jeg kanskje til å lese den. Og jeg kommer da til å skrive på norsk etterpå, siden forfatteren har sagt at han synes de som blogger om bøker bør gjøre det bare på morsmålet sitt, ikke på engelsk. Kanskje han kommer til å synes det er litt teit å få en bok andmeldelse på et språk han ikke kan lese selv? Eller kanskje han i grunnen gir faen.

Det kan også hende at jeg aldri kommer til å lese denne boka, den ser ikke ut til å være den mest spennende boka i verden, og jeg kommer hvertfall ikke til å betale for den, det er helt klart.

Interestingly enough, I think this book is a kind of supernatural sequel (or perhaps, an alternative-universe re-imagining) to the author's previous novel, Rosedale in Love -- Raphael's take on Wharton's The House of Mirth, from the viewpoint of Simon Rosedale, Jewish financier and suitor to the haughty Lily Bart.

I don't think one needs to be familiar with either Rosedale in Love or The House of Mirth to enjoy this novella; the story here is really about a Gilded Age widower's descent into depravity, first through sex and then through blood lust. In a brief 75ish pages, Raphael hints at a fascinating vampire mythology -- Jewish vampires have powers that other vampires don't -- and creates a kind of anti-hero who feels unappealing and likable in equal part. Not much happens in this novella, other than Rosedale's turning, but Raphael sets up an interesting supernatural universe, and it seems he has two more novellas in the works. (This makes me happy.)

The style of the story is very florid, like a pot boiler, Sheridan Le Fanu, or The Monk, and while at times it verged almost on purple, overall, I liked the ornate prose. (My vocab certainly expanded!) Raphael deals with sex more than his early 20th century counterparts and while he doesn't explicitly describe it, it's not obfuscated, so the squeamish might want to pass. I enjoyed the tawdry.

If you like supernatural, or historical supernatural, this is a great easy piece to snack on, especially during the hectic holiday season. Disappear and enjoy a little debauchery!

ROSEDALE,THE VAMPYRE by Lev Raphael is an interesting paranormal historical fiction set in 1907 New York City. A quick,short novella. A gothic tale, in true Edgar Allen Poe style,of lost love,and the transformation into a vampyre. Written with detail descriptions. Rosedale, is a Jew who is attacked and becomes a vampyre. When Rosedale's wife and child dies in childbirth he is left lost in his grief,alone,and adrift. He is "Risen"from the dead with quicken senses,lustful thoughts,a need for blood and soon learns he may be more powerful than Wadpole, he man who raised him from the dead.While, to me the plot was interesting, it was a little bewildering how Rosedale, had no quirks of being a vamp,his desire for blood,or no regrets but finds solace in his desire for blood,his increased lustful thoughts and his increased senses. He quickly learns to hunt his prey,and embraces his new found vampyre state. I feel the character needed more time to come into his role instead of embracing it completely,quickly and freely. But with this said, "Rosedale,the Vampyre" is an interesting,and dark gothic tale. This is my first by this author. I do feel another book is in the works for Rosedale,for he is not finished. Received for an honest review from the author and Pump Up You Book.
RATING: 4
HEAT RATING: HOT,SPICY
REVIEWED BY: AprilR, My Book Addiction and More/My Book Addiction Reviews

Stick Up for Yourself: Every Kid’s Guide to Personal Power and Positive Self-Esteem by Gershen Kaufman, Ph.D., et al. Epiphany library section 9 A: Juvenile (gr. K-5), Values. This book for ages 8-12 focuses on sticking up for yourself. To stick up for yourself, you need personal power and positive self-esteem.
To get these things, first you need to be able to recognize your feelings, like anger, frustration or fear. When you know what you are feeling, you can explain your feelings to others so they can see things from your point of view. It makes your feelings less scary too, and easier to control. This book even discusses degrees of the same feeling. For example, surprise or anger are low intensity feelings. What do they feel like at higher intensity? Surprise becomes being startled and anger becomes rage. It helps to know how strong your feelings are. With practice you will also be able to tell if someone else is just a little bit angry, or ready to pop their cork!
We all need to feel worthwhile, to feel like we belong, to care for others. When you understand what your needs are, you can check your feelings to see if those needs are being met or not. For example, if your need to feel like you belong is not being met, you might feel lonely. You could ask a friend over, or join a club to feel like you belong. This book also tells you ways to take a “feelings break,” such as riding your bike or reading a joke book.
You know how some kids try to lord it over others? They try to take away your power by bullying you, or by being unkind. This book tells you how and why kids do this, and how to keep your own personal power. If you are bullied or you are shy, there is lots of help for you here.
The last chapter is about self-esteem, not to be confused with conceit, arrogance or superiority. Self-esteem means being proud of yourself because you’ve done things you are proud of. When you join personal power with self-esteem you will be able to stick up for yourself. You will respect yourself enough to not let others take away your power. You will not follow others into mischief so easily either. You will be a more powerful, confident YOU!
This book has cartoon illustrations and is especially for kids (although your parents and teachers can learn a lot from it too). If you are 8-12 and have been picked on at school, been blamed for things you didn’t do, and wish you could stick up for yourself, this book can help!

Let's Get Criminal hooked me from the first page, when the arrival of Professor Perry Cross to the State University of Michigan threatens to unravel the longtime relationship between professors Nick Hoffman and Stefan Borowski. Hired under suspicious circumstances, with Borowski's recommendation, Cross brought with him a well-bred air of menace, so that when his body was found floating underneath a campus bridge, he left behind plenty of suspects, including Hoffman and Borowski. But while Cross is at the center of the mystery, Hoffman is the star of the book. Jealous of the past Cross and Borowski apparently shared, Hoffman reels from strength to weakness and back, using his good humor and acidic observations to keep himself standing. When Cross' death makes them suspects to a homophobic detective, Hoffman charges into the investigation. Let's Get Criminal is more than just a mystery story, because Raphael winningly portrays Nick and Stefan, highlighting their differences and examining how their love bends and changes under the pressures of the investigation. There's humor here, but also menace and sadness, and even triumph at the end. The trade paperback version carries a green banner on the cover announcing it is part of the Stonewall Inn Mysteries, a series which includes works by George Baxt, Mark Richard Zubro and Phyllis Knight. While I accept the idea that gay-themed mysteries should be marketed to gays, I never thought of Let's Get Criminal in that context. This is a book I would recommend to anyone who loves mysteries.

I had so much fun reading this book. Nick Hoffman is a clever, unassuming college professor who is coerced into hosting an Edith Wharton conference on his campus with the hope of tenure. He is more worried about the fact that Edith Wharton scholars are split into two groups and the strident interjections of homophobes than the possibility of a murder occurring. When the key note speaker is found dead, Nick's investigations turn up the gritty facts of university life and jealousies in the writing and publishing world. Nick gets support from his lover, Stefan, who is a writer and always knows how to soothe Nick when events overwhelm him.

The writing of this book is clever, intelligent, and humorous. I will be looking for more Nick Hoffman mysteries.½

The author's parents were both in Nazi concentration camps, survived and before 1954 came to New York, where the author was born. He becomes interested in learning more about his parents' experiences, and does some book tours in Germany and tells of his attitude to Germany, which changes when he comes to know the country. The book is easy to read, and is of mild interest, though I was not impressed by the author's detailed account of his sex life--which added nothing to the book.. I could not find the book of any special significane. and thought my time could have been better spent..

Not exactly a thrilling read. The plot meanders around, passing by numerous suspects, none less - or more - likely than the other. The stakes are far too low to be really capturing, the cops are campus police, and most of the characters (including our protagonists) are cardboard representations of whatever "ism" they're supposed to be. The whodunnit part isn't obvious, but not extremely surprising either.

Back in September of 2005 I received a rather desolate-sounding email from my friend Lev Raphael, who was on a book tour in Germany for Das deutsche Geld (the German edition of his novel The German Money): “Sick of tiny hotel rooms,” he wrote. “Sick of being alone. Sick of German breakfasts. Sick of beer.” I responded as my grandmother and mother would have done. I offered to send him sweet-potato pecan bread when he returned home. Because the natural response to any complaint in my family was “here, eat something.”

Looking back, I’m a little embarrassed at what must have seemed to Lev to be a rather glib response to what had been a very stressful trip for him. Little did I know that the seemingly inauspicious trip would be the beginning of a journey that would lead Lev here, to this book. I don’t think he knew either. At least, not at the point when, after a nightmare flight home, he wrote me and said, “I want to hide in bed for days.”

Lev and I have been corresponding for seven years now, although we have only met in person once. I call him my “literary pen pal” because he is one of the very few people on the planet who dares to recommend books to me, a career reader and bookseller. If you had asked me last month if I thought I knew Lev well, I would have said “sure, pretty well.”

Yet I was surprised by the man I met in Lev’s new memoir. His account of his return to Germany, his determination to discover what happened to his parents during the war, was relentless, honest, and often agonizing. I wasn’t surprised by the writing—I have always known Lev to be a fine, fine writer. But there are things in his memoir that I never imagined possible, and I was surprised, awed, that he had the strength to persevere in the task he set for himself, to trace his parents from concentration camp to concentration camp. Indeed, the first question I asked him in the following interview is one that simply burst out of me quite early when reading his story. “How could you go on?” How did you manage to keep looking, when each new discovery was horror after horror?

So yes, I’ve known Lev Raphael “pretty well” for quite awhile. But what I didn’t know, until I read this book, was how brave a man he really is.

Read the full interview

Perhaps only in a Lev Raphael title would Death of a Constant Lover refer to the 18th-19th century Swiss/French novelist Benjamin Constant rather than its ordinary adjectival meaning! Once again, Raphael's work transcends the categories into which it is tempting to place it. Yes, he writes "academic mysteries," in that they are set at the fictional State University of Michigan; yes, he writes "gay mysteries," in that his English professor and amateur detective Nick Hoffman is a gay man. But the quality of Raphael's writing makes his books stand out far beyond the typical entries in those fields, and Death of a Constant Lover is a fine example of the author's craft. The novel is well-plotted, and as always, the characters are well-developed. In particular, Nick and his partner Stefan are eminently likeable, and in depicting the relationship between the two men Raphael gives an engaging portrait of the domestic life of a gay male couple. In this book, too, the usually discreet author provides a lyrical description of the callipygian charms of graduate student Delaney Kildare, on display as he showers after a workout at the gym; gay male readers, as well as straight women, will probably relish the loving detail! Death of a Constant Lover, with its sophisticated writing and engrossing story line, is a fine addition to the Raphael's Nick Hoffman series.

The Edith Wharton Murders is a solid second entry in Lev Raphael's high quality mystery series featuring gay professor-cum-detective Nick Hoffman. Perhaps not as engaging as the other Hoffman novels, this literary-themed murder tale will nonetheless please Raphael's fans.

Let’s Get Criminal, Lev Raphael’s first foray into the mystery genre, introduces English professor-cum-amateur sleuth Nick Hoffman and sets an initial high standard that later entries in the series live up to. All the hallmarks of Raphael’s enjoyable detective novels are already evident in his 1996 debut. Likeable characters, a believable plot, and references to contemporary social issues - in this case, police homophobia - make for a quick and enjoyable read. However, I came to this book after reading the most recent Nick Hoffman mystery, this year’s Hot Rocks, and in comparison to Raphael’s latest work Let’s Get Criminal seems slightly less polished. For example, the wide-ranging references to literature, the arts, and current events that add so much to the pleasure of reading Hot Rocks are not yet in evidence in the earlier novel, and Raphael’s 1996 writing style seems less elegant and at times even a bit clichéd. These are minor flaws, though, which are probably noticeable only in hindsight. Even if it is a somewhat less mature work than later entries in the series, Let’s Get Criminal is still a highly entertaining introduction to the sympathetic Nick Hoffman: we see the beginning of his career as an amateur detective, an avocation that will eventually lead him to solve a whole series of murders that inexplicably keep popping up in his otherwise quiet Michigan university town.

The triple-entendre of its title is representative of the quality of Lev Raphael’s literate new Nick Hoffman mystery, Hot Rocks. Unlike many gay detective novels, Hot Rocks has a believable plot, well-developed characters, and skillfully composed prose. Personal trainer Vlado Zamaria turns up dead in the steam room of the Michigan Muscle health club, and English professor Nick Hoffmann, aided by his flashy colleague Juno Dromgoole, puzzles out the solution to the murder. Along the way, the novel is filled with references to politics, literature, music, and contemporary culture, as well as a sophisticated vocabulary (“exiguously” or “anchorite” or “epigone,” anyone?) unusual for its genre. However, the breadth of author Raphael’s interests and vocabulary never comes off as pretentious or pedantic. In fact, the only complaints I can make about Hot Rocks are its unusual, even cartoonish character names (Juno Dromgoole? Alfred Aftergood? Merry Glinka?) and its complete lack of sex scenes. Professor-cum-detective Nick Hoffman spends a fair amount of time naked in the locker room and wet areas of Michigan Muscle, but unfortunately Raphael is much too tasteful to go any further than such sparkling clean nudity. Nonetheless, the intellectual pleasure derived from the gradually unfolding wordplay of the title Hot Rocks is more than enough to make even the most prurient reader overlook the dearth of sex scenes and eagerly anticipate the continued adventures of Nick Hoffman and company.

I don’t think I’m the kind of person anyone really imagines would read Lev Raphael’s story collection, Secret Anniversaries of the Heart ($15.95). Or perhaps I should say, when the marketing department at Leapfrog Press got together (I’m imagining a couple of guys and a six pack) to discuss their target audience or likely readership, I probably didn’t make the list. There is some justification for this—the overwhelming reason people like a book is because they like, or think they are like, or perhaps wish they were more like its main characters. One of my greatest hurdles when I was a bookseller was trying to convince people to read a book about somebody they didn’t think they would want to know.

Secret Anniversaries of the Heart is a strongly-themed collection of stories that deals with issues of Jewish identity, the loss and finding of faith, growing up in the shadow of the Holocaust, coming of age and homosexual identity, and the insidious nature of anti-Semitism and homophobia. These are stories about what it is to be Jewish in a culture that consigns Jews forever to the realm of the exotic and foreign. What it means to be religious in an era that is materialistic and spiritually barren. What it means to be homosexual in a country where the veneer of tolerance is sometimes as thin as the membrane around the yolk of an egg, and what it means to live in the shadow of a horror so great its victims will never again be at peace.

These stories explore what it is to be a young, gay, Jewish and the child of Holocaust survivors.

I am almost none of those things. . .read full review

This relatively short novel feels a bit stiff for much of it. There's little warmth to the language, but this partly reflects the cold relationship amongst the characters, both among those still living and with those family members now departed.

However, as the novel reaches its denouement, there's an unexpected twist that grabs the reader, turning the whole story on its head and making a somewhat unremarkable story suddenly something quite unusual. Without giving anything away, certain aspects seem a bit implausible but definitely more memorable as a result.

An interesting insight into a certain American family.

This collection of essays by the author of Dancing on Tisha B'av, Winter Eyes, not to mention the Nick Hoffman mystery series, focuses on his twin comings-out, as a Jew and as a gay man. The child of Holocaust survivors, Raphael was raised in a secular Jewish household, and it was not until he was an adult that he began to explore and embrace his religion. In the process, he met Gersh, whom he would also explore and embrace ;-)) (sorry, irresistible!).

In an excellent essay, "Empty Memory? Gays in Holocaust Literature", Raphael addresses the question of gays in Nazi Germany, and has it right, I think, when he says that it is wrong to ignore or belittle the persecution of gays, but that it is also wrong, and historically inaccurate, not to understand the difference between the treatment of gays and the treatment of Jews, and the policy differences between them.

He does not allow himself, however, to separate his Jewishness and his gayness. He mentions speaking at a Jewish community center, along with a lesbian who is also the child of survivors, and being asked by other children of survivors why they "had to be gay" that evening! They could not understand his and Beck's "multiple identities as Jews, children of survivors, and homosexuals".

Here he says something important for all communities of faith, who ground their hatred of gays in the phrase, "It's religion". "Lies are lies. Hatred is hatred. As Jews we know what it sounds and feels and smells and tastes like. " When, at Yad Vashem's Hall of Remembrance, a ceremony to remember the gay and lesbian Jews who died in the Holocaust is interrupted by right-wing demonstrators calling the group "evil" and accusing them of blasphemy, this is no less hatred than the the demonization of Jews as Christ-killers, and the anti-Semitism of the Pat Buchanans of the world.

Not everything is this book is so intense, though. "Okemos, Michigan" is a heart-warming essay, describing how he and Gersh bought a house together, and how the house became a home. A humorous essay, "Selling Was Never My Line", will be appreciated by any author who has ever done a book tour.

I found connections between this book and my last, Isabel Allende's My Invented Country. Each is about how the writer's family history affected their writing, each describes exile (Allende's a physical exile from Chile, Rafael's a psychic exile as apart from the mainstream of straight, Christian America). And each tells us in the introductions of the impact of an act of terrorism. For Allende, two acts of terrorism: Tuesday, September 11, 1973, when a CIA-sponsored coup occurred that would send her into exile, when she lost a country, and Tuesday, September 11, 2001, which would make her view herself as an American, a day she found a country. For Raphael, the Oklahoma City bombing, which occurred on the day he received the offer to publish this book, sent the message that the terror that had savaged his family in Europe could strike much closer to home.