Rating: 
Summary: Story was told well but the biased views were unnecessary
Review: Anyone who wants to get a general summarized idea about the lives of Muslim women in different parts of the world will greatly benefit from this book. The book is divided into chapters covering different aspects of Muslim life as it relates to Muslim women: marriage, religion, traditions, taboos, etc, etc. It tells very interesting stories from the author's personal experiences about each aspect: what various Muslim women think of themselves wearing Hijab (a veil), what the women think of their arranged marriages, how the women explain some extreme rules of Islam, etc. etc. This book gives us answers coming from Muslim women themselves about the hundreds of questions non-muslims want to ask...Why I gave this book 4 stars instead of 5 is because I felt the author's bias many times while reading it. The author took every chance she got to ridicule the prophet Mohammad. She very clearly states that Mohammad's revelations were not coming from God, but to resolve his own family relationships, his many wife's rivalries of each other, and his own annoyances with people. For example, the author describes how when the Prophet was annoyed when guests stayed in his house too long during his wedding celebrations and wouldn't leave, while the Prophet was very impatient to make love to his new bride....that night the Prophet had a revelation that actually became a Hadith (a verse/law) in Koran that stated that a guest should come only if he's invited and leave when he finishes a meal... Now, I loved how the author was showing how ridiculous some revelations written in Koran are....and how she used these ridicules just at the right times in the book, to explain how so many Muslim women suffer because of these ridiculous revelations of the Prophet who really supposedly was just annoyed with some things in his life and tried to amend them by having "revelations"...The fact of the matter is, as a logical and reasonable person, I myself have agreed with the author quite a number of times, regarding all this ridiculousness of some extreme laws/revelations...just as I have agreed with other authors from my previous readings...who have shown me how ridiculous some laws in the Bible or the Old Testament (Torah) are.... But, as a fair person, I have to admit, that using these ridicules of verses in Koran in this particular book is not appropriate because this book's main point is to talk about the lives of women in the muslim world and not to ridicule some extreme laws of Islam. It is also not appropriate because the author is a journalist and should be absolutely UNbiased. This book comes across as more of a criticism of Islam than a book on Muslim women. So, in summary, if you want to learn something about the way Muslim women live and some things they go through, read this book, you will benefit from it. But be warned, that you will be also reading the author's biased criticism of Koran and Islam. TWO THUMBS UP Alina Uzilov / 2003
Rating: 
Summary: Engaging, well written but sounds like I need to read others
Review: It seems to me that there will never be a book about Muslim women that will speak truth to both western non-Muslims and Middle Eastern Muslims. And that is because we are both biased in our own way. Lifestyle and religion is personal and subjective. Most westerners think that Muslim women are oppressed because of the way we live and were raised. Many westerners think everyone should live like us. Most Muslim women do not think that they are oppressed because of the way they live and were raised. Many Muslim women think that we should live more like them. We can both be open minded, and we can both learn something about each other, but our biases, years in the making, will still be there. As a western account, this book is well-written, thought-provoking, engaging, and it opened my eyes to want to learn more about Muslim women. I did NOT think she "hated Islam and Arabic Muslims". I thought she was trying to understand them, even if she did not succeed. In some ways I was more sympathetic to Islam after reading this. In others, I was more critical. I agree that one cannot learn about Muslim culture from a non-Muslim westerner. I agree that I need to read books written by Muslim women. But if I *only* read books written by happy Muslim women, then they might leave out the parts about Islam that aren't so good. (See the reviews of "Daughters of Another Path" to see what I mean). You have to read both accounts, because there is no single truth. Can someone please recommend a Muslim women's account?
Rating: 
Summary: Looking for a thought-provoking read? No? Ok, then read this
Review: This book reads like a novel because that's basically what it is. Brooks tries her best to be a scholar, but she simply can't overcome her journalistic tendencies. So the book ends up being really great for someone who kinda sorta wants to know about women in Islam but doesn't want to think about it any deeper than a surface level.
Brooks plays up the negative and down plays the positive. Here is a synopsis of her argument: countries in the "Islamic world" are oppressive to women and inhumane! Freedom is restricted, human rights are constantly violated and life is basically a dismal affair for women. Oppressed, oppressed, beat up and knocked around, forced to wear layer upon layer of clothing in very hot desert climate, female circumcision (which is perpatuated by women themselves), the presentation of gross generalizations as fact, etc etc. These countries are backwards and the "West" is definitely better off, modern, full of equality and justice, the feminist movement, etc etc. (Oh yeah and by the way, where as the United States has never had a female present, in 1994 women led 3 Islamic countries. But let's forget that because I want to tell you about more atrocities. And nevermind the positive spin I COULD have put on things, because I have an agenda to push) Brooks is a journalist, not a scholar. The content is to be expected. If you want to read a good book about Muslim women, read something by Lila Abu-Lughod. She's an anthropologist. As a side note, reviewers shouldn't use the term "cultural relativism" unless they understand its meaning. And the ideas and intentions behind its use... You can be culturally relative and still believe that certain cultural practices are inherently wrong. No one is unbiased anyway. The point is to be aware of them. It's something Brooks often chose not to do, which is what makes her book such a shoddy rag.
Rating: 
Summary: Not Exactly The Truth
Review: When I first wanted to know about Islam I was at the bookstore and found this book. I thought it would help me to know a little about Islam and even more about the lives of Muslim women. After I read the book, I was even more determined to find out about what really is truth and fiction in Islam. While the author may very well have witnessed these stories she writes about in her book, she has sadly left out stories from the other perspective. These stories are not the example of typical Muslim womens lives. Many of the Arabic Muslim women I know would be shocked to see this type thing written about them. Islam and Muslims should not be incorrectly linked with the traditions of certain cultures/countries. Islam and culture are not the same. The author is also NOT an expert on Islam, the Qur'an, or Hadith. I hope this book will inspire others to look further and be informed. To know the truth, one should seek further knowledge and not just the word of one misonformed, western reporter. A better book to read is "Daughters of Another Path" which gives a more honest and accurate look at the lives of Muslim women.And an important aspect of "Daughters of Another Path" is that it includes the actual words and thoughts of many different Muslim women, and not the feelings necessarily of the author.
Rating:
Summary: Fascinating, well-written, but prejudiced
Review: As a non-Muslim who's been doing research on women in Islam, when I first ran across the reader reviews here, I figured they were just the complaints of religious Muslims oversensitive to any Westerner's depiction of them. But then I read the book. I was quite taken aback by some of Brooks's generalizations and sarcastic observations (she complains that it's hard to talk to someone who opens all conversations with the Bismillah--"always a disincentive to small talk"). The occasional hostility of her tone may well come from the obstacles she encountered as a woman traveling alone in the Middle East: she recounts being denied a hotel room, ordered to cover herself, and other harassment. But the unfortunate result is that her book sometimes reads like the supercilious and condescending travel narratives of Europeans during colonial times. Still, it's a wonderful read, full of vivid scenes and memorable characters--a great chance to visit a world most westerners will never see. Just don't take the author's opinions at face value.
Rating:
Summary: This is such a farce!!!
Review: I am a Muslim women - a convert, from Catholicism, converted right after Sept. 11th,2001 so for about 3 years - and I have been on 'both sides of the fence' (being a Muslim woman, and being a non-Muslim woman), and this book is - like another reviewer mentioned "touches the surface". Brooks does not even go into the REST of Islam, she doesn't provide the hadiths (sayings of the Prophet Muhammad (SAWS), who in Islam is our up-most example of the perfect Muslim), or the ENTIRE CONTEXT of the Qur'anic verses; she simply quotes [out of context] the parts that help her cause (bashing Islam and the way women are treated). If you want a real book that explains how women are treated in Islam pick up a translation of the Noble Qur'an, or The Complete Idiot's Guide to Islam (no, I'm not joking, it's a real book). This is absolute crap and she should be ashamed of herself for writing something so prejudice, baseless, and imcomplete!
Rating: 
Summary: Should be required reading for politicians everywhere
Review: Brooks has written an engaging, informative and lively book abt Islamic women. She crosses class and ethnic boundaries to interview women throughout the Middle East (Saudi Arabia, Iran, Egypt, Iraq, Israel/Palestine, Jordan). My only minor complaint is that she confines herself to the Middle East---as she argues that Saudi Arabian culture has spread and changed the Islamic world throughout the Middle East I wanted to know what was happening in the Islamic world outside of the Middle East (Indonesia, the former Soviet Republics, Africa etc).
That said, I would still recommend this book highly. Brooks' interviews with women---especially those who opted to wear the hijab and to advocate a restricted life for women in the name of radical/revolutionary Islam---are deeply insightful. I found the picture she painted of the Middle East incredibly tragic. This is a region where oppression of women is rampant. As Brooks herself points out if half of the male citizens of any country were denied their basic human rights, frequently subjected to genital mutilation or death after being raped, there would be an outcry throughout the world. But because we are talking abt Islamic women (many of whom live in oil-rich countries) there has been a reluctance on the part of the US and other industrialized nations to criticize the Middle East. Brooks' book is not a flat-out criticism of Islam---in fact, she shows through a discussion of 7th century Islamic beliefs and culture that Islam has the potential to create a world where women truly are equal to men and where women and men can enjoy the same rights and privileges. In many ways, Christianity and Judaism lack this potential and so Brooks' insight is especially interesting. This book should be read by politicians everywhere---not just women. Anyone who cares about human rights will benefit from reading this book.
Rating:
Summary: More balanced than most
Review: Books on Islam generate a lot of controversy these days, especially after 9/11. Having read several I found this one fairly balanced. Brooks is a reporter by trade, which at times leads to a bit of superficiality in the treatment of complex topics but on the whole makes this a relatively dispassionate treatment of women and Islam. Of course Brooks brings a Western point of view to her subject, and is intensely critical of a system where women are subject to male family members with few personal rights. She is careful to point out that Islamic law does provide for inheritance by women and allows a type of pre-marriage contract that can protect them from the husband's polygamy, give them the right of divorce, establish that their education will be allowed to continue, etc. But one suspects that these privileges are available only to the wealthy as a practical matter. Brooks is careful to distinguish various Muslim societies from one another, just as one sees huge differences among Christian countries. She along with most authors I've read has little good to say about Saudi Arabia. But interestingly, she identifies Iran as a more progressive society in which women are permitted to work and participate in politics. And Egypt is described as having a lively, sensual culture that she believes will never be snuffed out by fundamentalists. One of the more disturbing chapters of the book deals with education. The number of women in school is unacceptably low,education often ceases as women are wed at a very early age, and much schooling is focused on the study of Islam. Even more disturbing is the increasing control fundamentalists exert over educational institutions, which results in a student body much more conservative than the faculty who were educated in more open-minded times. And academic freedom has no place here. Brooks tries to identify areas of repression that she sees as cultural rather than religious. At the same time, she says that Muslims cannot rely on the improvements to womens' lives that occurred during the time of the Prophet to defend Islam today. It is sadly true that any religion that literally relies on a Sacred Text from hundreds of years earlier--Christianity included--will inevitably fail to respect the notions of individual liberty and equality that are the ideals of the modern world. Brooks' book was written over 6 years ago. The trends she identifies are very disturbing, but except for some vague familiarity with Ayatollah Khomeini, few Americans had any of this on their radar screens before 9/11. A book like this will hopefully lead to some better understanding of this complex subject.
Rating:
Summary: Really Improved My Opinion of Ayatollah Khomeni and Iran
Review: I'm an American woman who has lived overseas in Morocco for twelve years. My friends and I are reading this book for our monthly bookclub selection. None of us was able to put the book down, once we started it. We all read the book in one or two days. The author is a journalist who spent considerable time in the Middle East, reporting from various countries. Although this is not a scholarly work, it is well-researched. The book focuses on her own personal experiences in each country, and ancecdotes from various women she met in each country. For me, the most interesting parts of the book discussed the home and personal life of the Ayatollah Khomeni. After reading this book, my opinion of both him, and of Islamic life in Iran, went up by about 300 percent. The author met and interviewed his wife, and various family members. He was a fairly modern, new-age husband, and playful father, who even got up in the middle of the night and gave his kids their bottles, and changed their diapers. The only thing he was quite strict about was the Islamic religion. Anyone who is interested in the lives of women in the Middle East should read this book. The book is as accurate today as it was when it was written.
Rating:
Summary: Why Saudi Arabia?
Review: Other reviewers have lamented that Brooks focused on the Middle East in general and on Saudi Arabia in particular to the detriment of providing insight into Muslim societies outside of the Arab world. Perhaps a quote from the book explains why Brooks made this deliberate choice: "...Saudi Arabia is the extreme. Why dwell on the extreme, when it would be just as easy to write about a Muslim country such as Turkey, led by a woman, where one in six judges is a woman, and one in thirty private companies has a woman manager? I think it is important to look in detail at Saudi Arabia's grim reality because this is the kind of sterile, segregated world that Hamas in Israel, most mujahedin factions in Afghanistan, many radicals in Egypt and the Islamic Salvation Front Algeria are calling for, right now, for their countries and for the entire Islamic world. None of these groups is saying, "Let's recreate Turkey, and separate church and state." Instead, what they want is Saudi-style, theocratically enforced repression of women, cloaked in vapid cliches about a woman's place being the paradise of her home..." Brook's book was published in 1995. Nine years later, her assessment of Saudi Arabia's corrosive influence beyond its borders is still valid. Today, Wahabbi extremism, funded by Saudi backers, has spread out even further into the Philippines, Chechnya, Western Europe and the US in its most virulent and deadly form, terrorism. 9/11 hijacker Mohammed Atta's last written words requesting that no woman attend to his dead body betrays a poisoned philosophy that hates life as much as it hates women. Yes, Brooks expresses her opinion in every chapter. She is no more objective about religiously inspired misogyny than one can be about Nazis. To expect a completely neutral essay about either topic denies an understanding of the subject's inherent evil.
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