All Will Be Revealed [Hardcover]

Robert Anthony Siegel (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: March 16, 2007

A photographer is drawn to a beautiful psychic in a turn-of-the-century novel about love, possession, adventure, and greed. At the close of the nineteenth century, wheelchair-bound Augustus Auerbach s only interest is his extraordinarily lucrative business: the manufacture and marketing of exotic photographs. His outlook is forever altered, however, when one of his models pressures him to attend a séance. It is there that Augustus meets the medium Verena Swann, a beautiful widow who gives voice to the long-dead spirit of his mother. At the time of her first encounter with Augustus, Verena is close to nervous collapse, overwhelmed by the demands of her clients who are half-mad with yearning for their deceased loved ones. Her spiritual powers have begun to fail her, and now, forced to fake her public trances, she wonders if her ability to converse with the spirits was ever more than self-delusion. Though initially reluctant, Augustus embarks on a series of private sittings with Verena, finding himself increasingly drawn to her as much for personal reasons as for the proof of immortality she offers him. Verena, meanwhile, is torn between three men: Augustus, the millionaire pornographer; Captain Theodore Swann, Verena s adventurer husband, killed on an expedition to the North Pole; and Leopold Swann, Verena s brother-in-law and business partner who has decided that their next and greatest conquest will be Augustus himself.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Set in late 19th-century New York City, Siegel's second novel (after All the Money in the World) provides a fascinating tour of a pornographer's studio and a reluctant spiritual medium's parlor. Crippled from a childhood illness, the reclusive Augustus Auerbach has built a fortune in the pornography business; largely confined to his opulent mansion and rarely encountering people who are not employees or models, Auerbach is as incurious about others' lives as he is clueless about his own. His controlled existence begins to unravel when one of his models brings him to a séance conducted by the widowed (and crooked) medium, Verena Swann, who apparently connects him with the spirit of his self-absorbed and long-dead mother. As Verena attempts to escape her fraudulent vocation and the manipulative proposals of her business partner and brother-in-law, Leopold, an improbable romance blossoms between her and Auerbach. Siegel lays bare Verena's and Augustus's vulnerabilities as skillfully as they exploit those of others, but the novel's conclusion, which turns on Leopold's implausible machinations, fails to live up to its early promise. Readers willing to forgive the ending will find a richly detailed and seedily seductive narrative. (Mar.)
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From Booklist

In early-nineteenth-century New York, Augustus Auerbach, crippled since childhood, is obsessed with his highly lucrative work as a pornographer. Convinced that he is the pioneer of a new art form, he obsesses day and night over the details of his photographic sessions; he almost never goes outside and maintains only the most superficial relationships with his servants and employees. Then one of his most prized models talks him into attending a seance with spiritualist Verena Swann, whose gift has been exploited and augmented with fake special effects by her brother-in-law. When Verena appears to put Augustus in touch with his long-dead and much-loved mother, Augustus finds that he is no longer satisfied with the isolated life he has been living. Siegel is skillful at incorporating into his narrative many fascinating details about photography and spiritualism. In addition, he draws readers into the emotional lives of two stunted people who exploit others' vulnerabilities while failing to understand their own. This well-crafted novel offers both an unusual plotline and richly atmospheric settings. Joanne Wilkinson
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 282 pages
• Publisher: MacAdam/Cage (March 16, 2007)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1596922052
• ISBN-13: 978-1596922051
• Product Dimensions: 9 x 6.3 x 1.2 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.2 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.3 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (9 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,771,889 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

6 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Even better than his first novel., April 21, 2007

By 

Lou Glasser (New York City) - See all my reviews

This review is from: All Will Be Revealed (Hardcover)

A photographer who refuses to see people as anything more than the raw material for pictures. A spirit medium who has come to doubt the reality of her conversations with the dead. A deceased polar explorer who cannot quite bring himself to regret the journey that killed him. A disappointed lover who trains a performing bear to read minds. These are the characters that people the novel All Will Be Revealed.

Set in New York City at the close of the 19th century, this wonderful novel explores the hidden connections between three Gilded Age obsessions: pornography, Spiritualism and Arctic exploration. In doing so, it threads its way among a series of dualities: spirit and flesh, imagination and reality, the human need for connection and the fear of losing oneself in the other. It is funny, sad, brilliant, and very beautiful, and I loved it more than anything I've read in years. If you buy just one book, it should be this one.

5 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A spectacular exploration of character, March 27, 2007

By 

K. Bender "The Oxfordian" (Oxford, England) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: All Will Be Revealed (Hardcover)

All Will Be Revealed is a wonderful and unique novel that belongs in the same literary realm of Carson McCullers, Edith Wharton, and Flannery O'Connor. With the intuitive power of McCullers, the elegance of Wharton, and the strangeness of O'Connor, Siegel explores the ways his characters--Augustus Auerbach, Verena Swann and Theodore Swann--use pornography, spirit mediums and polar exploration as projections for their inability to truly love or mourn loss of ones they have loved. Entertaining, deeply felt, and beautifully written, All Will Be Revealed explores the ways people are afraid to reveal themselves to each other--and how they overcome these fears. It is a book wholly unique and immensely memorable; you will love it and recommend it to your friends. Bravo!

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars All Will Be Revealed, May 14, 2007

By 

David Murray (North Carolina) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: All Will Be Revealed (Hardcover)

Excellent read. Kept me up reading until my eyes blurred. Loved the ending. Thoroughly interesting characters.