This book tells the story of Eve (as in the Eve from Adam and Eve) and her family. Interestingly, it is told from the point of view of Eve and her daughters: Naava, Aya and Dara and not her more biblically well known sons, Cain and Abel. Each chapter is in a different voice. One thing I noticed is that Eve, Aya, and Dara's chapters are written in first person while Naava's chapters are in third person. It's sort of an interesting literary device. We found out through Eve's chapters how she and Adam were cast out of the Garden. The book details the family's new existence in an unknown world trying to live with strangers who worship multiple gods. Aya was definitely my favorite character in the book. She is crippled and back then, that was definitely looked down upon but she makes her way through life becoming the cook and the sort of alchemist for her family. She was a very cool character.
My two cents:
Usually when you hear about Adam and Eve, it's typically stories from when they were in the Garden. I really enjoyed hearing a different story about them and their family. I liked the writing in the book but the story really just meanders and doesn't go much of anywhere. I thought that the storyline with the strangers was going to be a little more of a big part of the book but the author doesn't give much service to that story arc. I also thought that the fight between Cain and Abel was going to play a more prominent role but it only factors in a little bit towards the end of the book.
I was really torn on whether to give this book 3 or 4 stars. I liked it and it was nice to read sort of historical fiction set that far back in time. The book was also a little reminiscent of The Red Tent, which is one of my favorites. As I said, the writing was really good. I just thought that the plot or even the point of the book could have been a little more well defined. In the end, I decided that the writing was worthy of the 4th star.
My rating:
4 out of 5 stars
This sounds very interesting - just wondering how this is written. Is the language modern-type even though we're talking about biblical characters here? And how did that affect how believable the story was?
ReplyDelete@randomizeme The language was fairly modern but without slang pretty much so it seemed a little formal at times. Some parts of the story almost seemed like magical realism to me, especially when Eve was recalling some of the stories from when she and Adam were in the Garden.
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