The Women of Rothschild

The Untold Story of the World's Most Famous Dynasty

By: Natalie Livingstone

Narrated by: Francesca Waters

In The Women of Rothschild, Natalie Livingstone reveals the role of women in shaping the legacy of the famous Rothschild dynasty, synonymous with wealth and power.

From the East End of London to the Eastern seaboard of the United States, from Spitalfields to Scottish castles, from Bletchley Park to Buchenwald, and from the Vatican to Palestine, Natalie Livingstone follows the extraordinary lives of the Rothschild women from the dawn of the 19th century to the early years of the 21st.

As Jews in a Christian society and women in a deeply patriarchal family, they were outsiders. Excluded from the family bank, they forged their own distinct dynasty of daughters and nieces, mothers and aunts. They became influential hostesses and talented diplomats, choreographing electoral campaigns, advising prime ministers, advocating for social reform, and trading on the stock exchange. Misfits and conformists, conservatives and idealists, performers and introverts, they mixed with everyone from Queen Victoria to Chaim Weizmann, Rossini to Isaiah Berlin, and the Duke of Wellington to Alec Guinness, as well as with amphetamine-dealers, suffragists and avant-garde artists. Rothschild women helped bring down ghetto walls in early nineteenth-century Frankfurt, inspired some of the most remarkable cultural movements of the Victorian period, and in the mid-twentieth century burst into America, where they patronized Thelonious Monk and drag-raced through Manhattan with Miles Davis.

Absorbing and compulsive, The Women of Rothschild gives voice to the complicated, privileged, and gifted women whose vision and tenacity shaped history.

A Macmillan Audio production from St. Martin’s Press.

©2022 Natalie Livingstone (P)2022 Macmillan Audio

Critic reviews

“[A] richly textured narrative. Drawing on archives, memoirs, and published sources, [Natalie Livingstone] focuses on the British branch of the family, examining eight generations of Rothschild women whose influence reached into politics, literature, social reform, Zionism, science, and the arts. … An engaging, authoritative, and refreshingly intimate history.” –Kirkus Reviews (starred)

“Livingstone’s vital and compelling book fills a gap in Jewish and women’s history and will appeal to readers of both. The book includes extensive notes, an index, and a very helpful family tree.” –Library Journal (starred)

“Reads like an epic novel...impressively researched and beautifully written.” –The Wall Street Journal

The amount of research the author must have had to deal with.

Reader's voice was sometimes difficult to deal with - pitched up and down. It was also raspy making it hard to grasp the words at times.

A great book

A book that I found to be highly detailed, interesting, and worthwhile to read and generally pleasant. I found this book also to be developmental and maturative for a young man coming of age such as myself. The whole story was great and chalk full of interesting facts that I never heard before! I further highly recommend this book.

Good review of some substantial contributions

I just wish she combined a little bit more about the banking that continued the accumulation of wealth. I know this is covered in other substantial treatises. I don’t think it would add too much length to the book.

Most interesting.

It is novel way to revisit, or learn history. It’s not necessary to remember all the names and dates to get a sense of the 18th, 19th and 20th century events, people and countries that shaped the world. It expands one understanding of the world.

Tedious

(As posted in Goodreads)
Not only is this not my type of book but I found the writing horrible. I'm not that fond of history books, but when it feels like they simply list occurrences with no underlying story, it's tedious at best. This was a book club book, and I know some people in my book club like the p format and far prefer history over fiction, but I have read history books and I even enjoyed them, but they didn't strike me as simply a listing of facts; there was an actual story there. To me, this book did not fit in that category I kept thinking that maybe I skipped to a future burn in the book, It may actually redeem itself, but it never did I could not finish it.

Very difficult book

I found this to be so exceedingly boring that I couldn’t wait for it to end. I did not like the narrator who read in an annoyingly high pitch. I could not relate to these characters who were often just portrayed as just t simply rich and spoiled. I learned more about fashion, hairstyles and drawing room furnishings then I ever want to hear about again. I ‘m really sorry because I hate writing bad reviews and I really wanted to enjoy and learn a lot but, could not recommend this to anyone I know.

AWFUL

The reader’s voice was off putting from the start. Furthermore, who really cares about so many of the details. I wish I could receive my credit back!!!! Waste

Academic

Detailed, and somewhat academic. Did not keep my interest. It was just meh. I a history buff but this was too long.