Lavender House by Lev AC Rosen

Forge, an imprint of Macmillan, (October 2022)

Lavender House, 1952: the family seat of recently deceased matriarch Irene Lamontaine, head of the famous Lamontaine soap empire. Irene’s recipes for her signature scents are a well-guarded secret – but it’s not the only one behind these gates. This estate offers a unique freedom, where none of the residents or staff hide who they are. But to keep their secret, they’ve needed to keep others out. And now they’re worried they’re keeping a murderer in.

Irene’s widow hires Evander Mills to uncover the truth behind her mysterious death. Andy, recently fired from the San Francisco police after being caught in a raid on a gay bar, is happy to accept – his calendar is wide open. And his secret is the kind of secret the Lamontaines understand.

Andy had never imagined a world like Lavender House. He’s seduced by the safety and freedom found behind its gates, where a queer family lives honestly and openly. But that honesty doesn’t extend to everything, and he quickly finds himself a pawn in a family game of old money, subterfuge, and jealousy—and Irene’s death is only the beginning.

When your existence is a crime, everything you do is criminal, and the gates of Lavender House can’t lock out the real world forever. Running a soap empire can be a dirty business.

Lev Rosen writes books for people of all ages, most recently Camp, which was a best book of the year from Forbes, Elle, and The Today Show, amongst others and is a Lambda finalist, an ALA Rainbow List Top Ten and is being adapted into a film directed by and starring Billy Porter. His next book, Lavender House, will be released fall of 2022. He lives in NYC with his husband and a very small cat. You can find him online at LevACRosen.com and @LevACRosen

Filed Under: Fiction & Humor Tagged With: ,

Jack of Hearts (and other parts) by L.C. Rosen

(Little Brown Books for Young Readers, 2018)

Pretty Little Liars meets Dan Savage in this modern, fresh, YA debut about an unapologetically queer teen working to uncover a blackmailer threatening him back into the closet.

Jack has a lot of sex–and he’s not ashamed of it. While he’s sometimes ostracized, and gossip constantly rages about his sex life, Jack always believes that “it could be worse.”

But then, the worse unexpectedly strikes: When Jack starts writing a teen sex advice column for an online site, he begins to receive creepy and threatening love letters that attempt to force Jack to curb his sexuality and personality. Now it’s up to Jack an his best friends to uncover the stalker–before their love becomes dangerous.

Ground-breaking and page-turning, Jack of Hearts (and other parts) celebrates the freedom to be oneself, especially in the face of adversity.

L. C. Rosen, also known as Lev Rosen, has written several books for adults and children, but this novel is his YA debut. His books have been featured on numerous Best of the Year lists and nominated for several awards. He lives in New york City with his husband and a very small cat.

For more on Lev visit levacrosen.com

Filed Under: Fiction & Humor Tagged With: , ,

Wondabout by Lev AC Rosen. Illustrated by Ellis Rosen.

wondaboutWelcome to Woundabout, where routine rules, and change is feared. But transformation is blowing in the wind…

In the wake of tragedy, siblings Connor and Cordelia with their pet capybara are sent to the precariously perched town of Woundabout to live with their eccentric aunt. Woundabout is a place where the mayor has declared that routine rules above all, and no one is allowed to ask questions.
But Connor and Cordelia can’t help their curiosity when they discover a strange crank that mysteriously fits into certain parts of town, and by winding the crank, part of the town is transformed into something beautiful. When the townspeople see this transformation, they don’t see beauty, they only see change. And change, the Mayor says, is something to fear. With the Mayor hot on their trail, can Connor and Cordelia find a way to wind Woundabout back to life?

Lev AC Rosen is the author of the critically acclaimed ALL MEN OF GENIUS (Tor, 2011), which was an Amazon best of the month, on over a dozen best of the year lists, and has been nominated for multiple awards. His middle grade novel, WOUNDABOUT, will be published by Little Brown Books for Young Readers in Summer 2015. His post-apocalyptic noir novel DEPTH will also be published in Spring 2015 with Regan Arts. His second middle grade novel, THE MEMORY WALL, will be published by Knopf Books for Young Readers in 2016. He received his BA from Oberlin College and his MFA in Creative Writing from Sarah Lawrence College. Lev teaches creative writing and lives in Manhattan.

Ellis Rosen’s illustrations can be seen at EllisRosen.com.

Publishers Weekly
Recently orphaned when their fathers—who trained bomb-sniffing capybaras—were killed in an explosion, siblings Connor, 11, and Cordelia, nine, have no relatives except their Aunt Marigold, who they have never met. When they arrive in the town of Woundabout, along with a surviving capybara, Connor and Cordelia discover that their aunt’s home is just as “weird” as their fathers had hinted—the town has no Internet service, the mayor doesn’t allow questions, and everyone in Woundabout is expected to stick to a predictable daily routine. When the mayor’s prized artifact goes missing, Cordelia and Connor decide to track it down. With the help of a boy named Nico, they begin to uncover the truth behind Woundabout’s origins and strange traditions in a fairy tale–like novel that weaves a gentle spell as it builds to a dramatic, satisfying conclusion. Lev Rosen (All Men of Genius) sensitively addresses change, growth, and painful emotions like grief, while Ellis Rosen’s b&w illustrations are alternately haunting, comedic, and poignant, in keeping with the overall tone of the story.

Filed Under: Fiction & Humor, Illustrators Tagged With: , ,

All Men of Genius by Lev AC Rosen

Inspired by Shakespeare’s Twelfth Night and Oscar Wilde’s The Importance of Being Earnest, All Men of Genius takes place in a Victorian London familiar but fantastical, where mad science makes the impossible possible.

Violet Adams wants to attend Illyria College, a widely renowned school for the most brilliant up-and-coming scientific minds, founded by the late Duke Illyria, the greatest scientist of the Victorian Age. The school is run by his son, Ernest, who has held to his father’s policy that the small, exclusive college remain male-only. Violet sees her opportunity when her father departs for America. She disguises herself as her twin brother, Ashton, and gains entry.

But keeping the secret of her sex won’t be easy, not with her friend Jack’s constant habit of pulling pranks, and especially not when the duke’s young ward, Cecily, starts to develop feelings for Violet’s alter ego, “Ashton.” Not to mention blackmail, mysterious killer automata, the way Violet’s pulse quickens whenever Ernest speaks to her, and a deadly legacy left by Ernest’s father. She soon realizes that it’s not just keeping her secret until the end of the year she has to worry about: it’s surviving that long.

Lev AC Rosen is the author of the critically acclaimed ALL MEN OF GENIUS (Tor, 2011), which was an Amazon best of the month, on over a dozen best of the year lists, and has been nominated for multiple awards. His middle grade novel, WOUNDABOUT, will be published by Little Brown Books for Young Readers in Summer 2015. His post-apocalyptic noir novel DEPTH will also be published in Spring 2015 with Regan Arts. His second middle grade novel, THE MEMORY WALL, will be published by Knopf Books for Young Readers in 2016. He received his BA from Oberlin College and his MFA in Creative Writing from Sarah Lawrence College. Lev teaches creative writing and lives in Manhattan.

Filed Under: Fiction & Humor Tagged With: ,