The Red Tent

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Summary: Review of Audio Production Only
Review: Who decided some of the most disturbing stories of all time (We're talking just as troubling as "Salo" or "Caligula" here!!) should be read with all the bizarre (almost perverse) cheeriness of a muffin ad?!! This isn't a margerine ad or a ring around the collar treatment-it ruins the whole story-you're so transported by this manipulative ad tone that you lose the story somehow! Where do they find these people?

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Summary: The Red Tent
Review: This is a truly masterful book that embodies the role that women might have played in biblical times. The story of Dinah and her aunts is absolutely magical. It show that true bonds that women can have with eachother through childbirth and sisterhood. When reading The Red Tent, one really feels like the characters come alive and you have known them their entire lives. Anita Diamant has done an excellent job capturing the reader and taking them on a marvelous journey with Dinah. A must read for women!

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Summary: The Humanity of the Bible
Review: This may be the most beautiful book that I have ever read. It is the story of Jacob's family from Genesis (about chapters 29 through 50) as told through the voice of Dinah, the only daughter of Jacob. We hear little of Dinah in the finished product of Genesis. The story goes that she is raped by the prince of Shechem, and her father, Jacob is offered a hefty brideprice from the king, but demands that all the men of Shechem be circumsized. Surprisingly, they agree and all the men, including King and prince, go under the knife. On the third day of their recovery, the sons of Jacob slaughter all of the men of Shechem and plunder the city. We hear nothing else about Dinah. It's a disconcerting story and it leaves me begging for all the behind-the-scenes details that the Bible leaves out. There happens to be a Jewish tradition called Midrash where the imaginations of God's people fill in the blanks that the Bible leaves us.

Anita Diamant follows in this tradition and makes a remarkable contribution to it. The Red Tent is a very human perspective of the biblical story, bringing to life the polytheistic culture and their connection and dependence to the things of the earth. It imagines possible motivations, reactions, emotions, and relationships of the family that are left out of the biblical telling of the story. The "red tent" is meeting place for the women of the family during the "new moon" of their menstruation and it is an image of the strong sense of womanhood that is celebrated in the book. It is refreshing to hear the biblical story from a woman's voice. After reading it, I told my wife I feel like I understand her better.

I was a biblical studies major at Messiah College and this major gave me a more human understanding of the Bible, knowing that the authors were the people of God trying to interpret their own history. This point of view helps me deal with a lot of disconcerting passages in the Hebrew Bible/Old Testament such as Dinah's tale. The Red Tent gives me a story which adds vision and imagination to this point of view. It is artfully written and reading it was to be a participant in something beautiful.

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Summary: Fanciful and Long
Review: Although this was an entertaining novel, I think that the third section could have been left out entirely. It dragged on far too long, and did not really accomplish anything. Overall it was too fictionalized to even be half believable, otherwise I might have enjoyed it more.

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Summary: My favorite book of all time
Review: To me, I know I've read a truly good book when I have a hard time coming back to reality after I've read it. This is one of those books that I became so absorbed in that I lived it. And I re-live it each time I reread it. I'm sad that I have to come back to my own world each time I finish it.
Diamant has done an excellent job turning a few unemotional biblical details into a novel that captures the flavor of the historical time it covers, particularly from a woman's perspective - but also just in general. It is to me a clear case of fiction being truer than fact. The characters come alive, have personalities and motivations that you just can't discern from the biblical version.
While it differs from the biblical story in many details, this actually alerted me to things I had missed in the Old Testament version of the story - the teraphim, the handmaidens... as well as giving me the perspective: "Hey, I never thought of it that way, and I bet it did happen like that back then!".

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Summary: Finished in no time!
Review: This book had been recommended to me by many friends, I finally got to read it, and was quickly emersed. The book was insightful for anyone. The book, is not a story about religion but a story about women.

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Summary: Intriguing look into the world of women
Review: This book is excellent and tells a fascinating tale of the women from the beginning of the bible. I highly recommend it.

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Summary: great!
Review: I really did not think I was going to like this book but, I was very pleasantly surprised. I finished it in three sittings in two days and I would have finished in one if I had that much time at once. I don't think this is a book many men would enjoy but, I wouldn't classify it strictly a romance novel. I think it it important to know that this is fiction as some of the Christian readers were offended and thought they were getting something Biblically accurate. It is a beautiful story, well written that left me with happy and sad tears.

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Summary: Loved this book!
Review: An easy, yet wonderful, read. I wanted to skip my vacation just to sit in the hotel and finish this book! Some men might even enjoy this book, but I would imagine its magic to shine brighter in the eyes of a woman.

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Summary: A page-turner is an understatement. Very highly recommended.
Review: Dinah is Jacob's only daughter and your very close friend along those hours you spend reading her story. Dinah's story with all its losses, gains, happiness, sorrow, tears, laughter, failure, triumphs and with all its blood will change you. It will change the way you look at the Bible and how you perceive its stories next time you read it. It will change your perception of pain and sacrifice. It will change the definition of family and friendship in your psyche. It will depress and regale you and then it will kiss you goodbye. This is one of the most remarkable stories I have ever read. Though it is a work of fiction, it's very credible. For all I care, this could have been Dinah's real story it's that good.

The story is told from Dinah's perspective as she recounts her childhood memories with her mothers: Leah, Rachel, Zilpah and Bilhah. She takes you into a world you only read about in the Bible or the Koran. Through her words you will go through a world of shepherds, sorceress, oracles, traditions, customs, midwives, honor, and, of course, the red tent. She continues telling you about her heart's joy and pain as her mind sways between sanity and insanity, between love and hatred. She tells you stories from Canaan and Egypt as her life takes her from the former to the latter with great anguish and agony. She tells you the story of Joseph and his climb to power in Egypt. She gets to tell you about her relationship with Jacob-her dad. She finally gets to talk directly to you since the Bible did her no justice by completely ignoring her story.

I highly recommend reading this book. It would be great if you can get a friend, partner or a family member to read it with you so you can discuss it afterward. There is ample material worth discussing in this very well-written prose. This book is a light read and you will be breezing through it in little time for that the characters will take you out on a ride of historic proportions that will keep you asking for more.