Literature Page

Author: Diamante, Anita

Age: Upper teen to adult.

Genre: Historical fiction.

Topics for Discussion: women's position/role in society, historical definitions of family, Biblical account of Dinah.

Summary: The novel uses the very brief Biblical account of Dinah, Jacob's only daughter, as a jumping off point to depict Diamante's vision of what life was like for women of the time. She chronicles not only the life of Dinah, but back tracks to reveal her own version of Jacob's marriage to first Leah and then Rachel. The novel then proceeds to Dinah's birth, childhood, and rape, which Diamente transforms into Dinah's love affair and potential marriage that is botched by her greedy brothers. Diamente then creates a life for Dinah beyond her ambiguous adulthood, sending her off to Egypt to raise her child.

Book Review: I admit it...I got caught up in all the hype this one generated and read it only because I wanted to see what everyone was talking about. I should have remembered that I was now back to living in a liberal state and that what everyone else was talking about would not appeal to me. I quickly discovered that the reason it recieved such high praise in this part of the world is because the novel attempts to destroy the Biblical account of Jacob and his family. The writing itself is fairly mediocre, following the current trend in historical fiction writing. While the story itself is somewhat interesting, the popular interest the novel generated obviously came from its sensationalism and immoral depictions.

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Christian Perspectives: Obviously, there is no way that I can recommend this book for Christian readers. The only point of the book is to destroy Judeo-Christian concepts, values, and history. In addition, the book depicts objectionable situations and pagan activities. This is definitely not a book that stayed on my bookshelf for very long!