Rating: 
Summary: A wonderful story
Review: This is the first "fiction" book that I have read in a very long time. It has more than lived up to my expectations. Almost every woman in my family has read this book, and with good reason. It is a wonderful story, with touching and vivid descriptions of what it is like to be wife, mother, daughter and friend. I was sad to have the story end.
Rating: 
Summary: Setting the record straight...
Review: Two words: historical fiction!!!Anita Diamant did an absolutely beautiful job portraying the world of women during Old Testament times. Because of the patriarchal nature of that society, the Old Testament has very few details about the women, this book merely provides a possible and probable scenario. As far as any discrepancies between biblical accounts and those in the Red Tent, one need only remember that very rarely will two witnesses to the same event have identical recollections of the event. Every one has his or her own unique perspective. As to the reviewer who claimed that the biblical account describes Joseph as spoiled; read Genesis again. Joseph was his father's favorite, he was hated by his brothers because of this, not because of his attitude. Also, in Genesis, Abram's named is changed to Abraham by God when God promises that Sarah will have a child, and that Abraham's descendant's will be as numerous as the stars in the sky. Therefore, the use of the Abram name by Diamant is perfectly acceptable. There are some differences between the biblical account and the Red Tent, however, they seem to be related to the particular narrator's point of view rather than anything that will drastically shake the foundations of Judaism or Christianity. One must also remember that many so-called Christian symbols and rituals have their roots in the fertility religions of the same regions. When early Judeo-Christians married into other tribes and other religions, or came to this new religion from an old one,they brought some of the symbols and gave them slightly new meanings. Hate to break the news folks, but the evangelical Christianity of today is a far, far cry from the brand of religion that Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Jesus, Peter, and even Paul
knew.
The Red Tent: Two thumbs up!
Rating:
Summary: Jacob's clan from the female viewpoint
Review: This excellent historical novel was recently donated to our church library, and as librarian, I read it. This novel tells the story of Jacob's clan in the Old Testament or Torah, from the viewpoint of Dinah, his daughter. The story tells about what women's lives were like then, and their work in the clan, from food gathering, preparation and storage, weaving and spinning, time spent in the red tent to coincide with the lunar calendar, girls' coming of age, and child birth experiences, along with the training and practice of ancient midwifery. the Bible gives the bare bones of this story, and the novel extends it. It contrasts the life of the nomads like Jacob's clan with the lush life of the Egyptians by the Nile, to life in the Valley of the Kings amongst the craftspeople who worked on the pharaohs' tombs. I recommend this book especially for women, who want to know what life might have been like for women during the Old Testament in the pre-Judaism period. The wording and vernacular make you feel you are truly back in that time. Women of all faiths will enjoy this book, and so would men. However, the book is strictly from a female point of view to the point that the male characters are rather mysterious, sometimes loving, but sometimes chauvinistic and uncaring about the women's feelings; they order the women about, one woman in paticular is regularly beaten and abused, and women are seen strictly as servants of the men. Within this life style, some of the women have power within the tribe, especially in ruling the lesser women like the servants and concubines, and in female matters. I found it very interesting and certainly widened my view of what life was like for women back then.
Rating:
Summary: Worth the Wait
Review: This book was a struggle until I reached the
second part of the story. Ms Diamant shines
from this point on. I have recommended it to several
friends despite the slow start.
Rating:
Summary: The perfect read for a new mother
Review: My husband gave me this book for Christmas after the birth of our first child, a daughter, a month before. I do not know if I would have appreciated this tale of the bonds between women and their relationships with the moon and her cycles as much had I not just given birth to a daughter.
This story, through its portrayal of women as chattal, actually gives us an understanding of the mystic strength of women and the power they possessed even in such dismal times for women's suffrage. Dinah and her "mothers" each hold a secret strength that enables them to not only survive but triumph over the daily life of their era, which by today's standard (at least in the US), is unthinkable.
I especially warmed to the stories of the Red Tent itself and the time the women spent in its shroud.
I will give this to my daughter to read when she is old enough.
Rating:
Summary: Great read!
Review: This book is really broken into three pieces. You'll fly through the first third, start wondering what else can possibly happen in the 2nd and then be completely amazed by the turn of events in the third. Its a must-read for women and a great book for book clubs. There's a lot to discuss. Anita Diamant is a great author and really makes you love and know her characters.
Rating:
Summary: Four Stars for Skill, One Star for Content
Review: Diamant is a writer of great skill and has woven a book both poignant and powerful, with beautifully crafted characters I could see easily as I read. As I woman, I wept at some of the loving descriptions of the beautiful mysteries shared by women of all time. But the inescapable fact, glaring throughout the book, is that it is a work of slander and defamation of historical and, to many around the world, heroic figures who are not around to defend themselves. The previous reviewer with the most apt and concise description of the book has said that it is "profoundly anti-Judeo-Christian". The foremost theme of this fiction is worship of the mother goddess, frowned upon then as now by the first of the ten commandments. Abram(never Abraham) is not the father of a great nation of promise, but a countrified oaf; Jacob a crass, insensitive tyrant; and Joseph, no longer the moral giant who perseveres through faith over rejection and crushing prejudice, is now a whiny, spoiled opportunist. The women and their numerous pagan dieties hold the only moral high ground available here.
The most telling indictment of Biblical patriarchical structure comes from Dinah's own mouth as she shrieks thunderous curses at Jacob, Joseph and all his brothers, whereupon they, of course, tremble and begin loss of health, wealth and influence right away. Her wrath seems entirely justified by the sensational slasher story preceding it, which, unfortunately, many people will take as truth. An artful wordsmith evokes our deepest gut-level response, and Ms. Diamant has done this well.
Rating: 
Summary: Where is God's providence?
Review: I enjoyed for the most part this work of historical fiction as it was well written and revealed some interesting insights of the biblical story taken from the last half of Genesis. The account of Dinah takes only one chapter almost as a footnote and what happens to her after her unhappy incident that we can only imagine, which is what Anita Diament does most creatively.
What I found disappointing was the book taking leave of the theme of the original story and adding themes that are not there. For instance in Genesis Joseph starts as a spoiled child and becomes a man of great moral character who forgives his brothers but the book makes him to be a nice child but becomes a bitter calloused old man who can barely tolerate his family anymore. Also the original account has Joseph resisting the advances of Potifar's wife and being falsely accused and imprisoned though the book would have us believe that Joseph was jailed because he did have an affair with her. Underlying the original account and conspicuously absent from the book is the providence of God in directing the lives of Jacob and his children. The theme of this family (and ultimately a nation) being led by God through numerous hardships but finally being saved from certain starvation is the most interesting one. As Joseph tells his brothers in Egypt near the end of Genesis referring to them selling him into slavery, "You ment it for evil but God ment it for good."
Rating: 
Summary: WRONG WRONG WRONG
Review: I couldn't even finish this novel because of the incredible inaccuracies to the true Biblical account. I enjoy novels which use actual biblical stories as a backdrop and expand on actual accounts and characters, suggesting what "could have happened," as long as they keep the facts straight, but the author of this novel changed so many of the facts that I could not enjoy the novel and finally got rid of it. The Biblical truth is so much more interesting that what she came up with anyway. I read the book because a friend of mine who does not know the Bible asked me to read it and tell her if it was true, because she assumed the author wouldn't have changed the actual story thus she believed everything the author wrote. After reading as much as I could endure, I told my friend the true story and pointed her to the actual account in the Bible, but I'm afraid she will always get the story wrong now that she has The Red Tent stuck in her head. The author had a chance, but she blew it!
Rating:
Summary: Stunning Biblical Masterpiece
Review: The Red Tent took my breath away. Its absorbing narration, provided by the character of Dinah, the daughter of Jacob and Leah, is timelessly poignant. The story is original and entrancing, but it's the women who make the lasting impression. The strength, soul, and wisdom of the female characters made me feel like I was included in a secret society -- the society of women, a world which men have never been able to understand and have therefore written off many times. I strongly recommend this novel to anyone, and I count it among my favorites.
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