Saving Grace

A young woman in New York is caught between her politician father and a manipulative lover in a novel that offers “sheer enjoyment” (Library Journal).

Jonathan Fleishman has always been perceived as the rarest kind of politician: as idealistic as he was powerful, genuinely committed to the good of the people. For Jonathan, public approbation is the oxygen he breathes; so it is deeply galling that the one person who refuses to see his worth is his own beloved daughter, Grace. When his spotless record is challenged by accusations of corruption leveled by Gracie’s lover, a ruthless young journalist named Barnaby, Jonathan’s good life is abruptly shattered. And Grace, faced with the betrayal of a lover who used her to get at her father, comes to realize that neither man is what he seems, even to himself. 

Saving Grace is an intricately textured book, a portrayal of a family in crisis and an exploration of the intersection between public and private lives. Library Journal called Saving Grace the book that “Bonfire of the Vanities tried to be.”

Barbara Rogan has spent virtually all of her career in the publishing industry: as an editor, a literary agent, a writer, and a teacher. She graduated from St. John’s College with a liberal arts degree and started working as a copyeditor with a major New York publishing house. Shortly thereafter, she moved to Israel, where she became the English-language editor of a Tel Aviv publishing house, and a while later she launched the Barbara Rogan Literary Agency to represent American and European publishers and agents for the sale of Hebrew rights. Among the thousands of writers she represented were Nadine Gordimer, Isaac Bashevis Singer, Abba Eban, Irwin Shaw, John le Carré, and her childhood favorite, Madeleine L’Engle.

At the age of twenty-six, she was appointed to the board of directors of the Jerusalem Book Fair, the youngest director ever to serve on the board. During this period, her first novel, Changing States, was published simultaneously in England, the United States, and Israel. For some time, she continued to write and run the agency, but eventually followed her passion to become a full-time writer. Since then, she has produced seven more novels, including Hindsight, Suspicion, and Rowing in Eden. Her fiction has been translated widely and graciously reviewed. About Suspicion, the Washington Post wrote, “If you can put this book down before you’ve finished it, it’s possible that your heart may have stopped beating.”

“What Bonfire of the Vanities tried to be,” Library Journal wrote of Saving Grace. Café Nevo was called “unforgettable” by the San Francisco Chronicle and “an inspired, passionate work of fiction, a near-magical novel” by Kirkus Reviews. Rogan also coauthored two nonfiction books and contributed essays to several published anthologies. To read more about Rogan’s work, visit her website, www.barbararogan.com.

Rogan taught fiction writing at Hofstra University and SUNY Farmingdale for several years before trading her brick-and-mortar classroom for a virtual one. Her online courses and editing services are described on her teaching website, www.nextlevelworkshop.com. As a professional whose experience spans all aspects of publishing, Rogan is a frequent presenter at writers’ conferences, seminars, and retreats.