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Saturday, June 4, 2011
A Reluctant Queen, The Love Story of Esther, by Joan Wolf
My Review of: "A Reluctant Queen, The Love Story of Esther", by Joan Wolf
This book is a fictional story based upon The Book of Esther, from the Bible. It takes place during 485BC, in Susa, under the new leadership of the new King Ahasuerus, who spent his summers in Ecbattana where it was cooler, as Susa was so hot.
Esther had been raised by her Uncle, Uncle Mordecai, after a massacre happened in her hometown of the land of Edomites, where they were then driven into exile in Babylon. During this invasion, both her parents were killed and Uncle Mordecai took her in as his own to raise her. Esther had been raised as a Jewish girl.
There came a time when the Edomites sent a letter to the Great King asking him to confirm their rights to southern Judah. They got it, but, the Prophet,Obadiah were in a frenzy claiming Edomite stole southern Judah. Mordecai was worried about war breaking out and got an idea that if Esther got into the palace to represent the Jewish people, then she could be the one to help their people.
Esther wasn't so sure about this plan. What about the boyfriend she had and was thinking of possibly marrying? Would he still be home waiting for her when she got back?
Esther really didn't understand the role she would end up playing at the palace. What was her destiny meant to be? How could 'she' do anything that would help her people? The decision was made for her and she still couldn't quite understand why. She would be the one to go to the palace and take the chance of possibly marrying the King. She never thought it would happen to her. It would be one of the other girls. That's good, she thought, her father was not Jewish and this is how she would enter the palace, but would she even be accepted if the King knew her mother was Jewish? This fact would have to be kept secret. She got to the King's Harem and was greeted badly. Put down for how her hair and skin looked. Thus, started the beauty regime.
Eventually the King does choose Esther as his Queen. She falls deeply in love with him, he deeply in love with her. She never tells him she is part Jewish until . . . this is when she finally understands why and what her role is to play as the Queen. Can't go on anymore because there will be to many spoilers! I think anyone who enjoys reading novels about the books of the Bible will enjoy this story very much and they will enjoy the story in historical detail.
I really enjoyed this book a lot. I loved how the author turned this story into a book. I like it when the books of the Bible are turned into novels. It seems as if we can relate to them much better than reading the Book of the Bible by itself when it has been turned into a story that is much more easily understood. It certainly adds to the stories.
This author took great care in writing this story to make sure the history and everything related exactly as it did in the Bible at that time. The last time I read a book like this that related to a book of the Bible was "The Red Tent" by Anita Diamant, which turned out to be one of my favorite books. This book is also similar to "Hadassah, One Night with the King, A Novel" by Tommy Tenney.
Personally, I really like the Books of the Bible turned into novels a lot. I love how the research is done to a "T", and how we can relate to the Bible story even better than what we can when it is woven into a story rather than just by reading the book of the Bible. I enjoy these novels very much when they are put into the perspective of their every day life back then. For us today, it is hard to read the books of the Bible when we don't understand the daily, routine life they had back then. It's wonderful when an author such as Joan Wolf comes along and puts these stories into novels that we can understand when they are so detailed such as this one it. I would read this book again, I enjoyed it so much. I give this book a 4.5 star.
This book was provided to me for free by LitFuse Publicity Group in exchange for a review! Thanks to them for the opportunity!
MORE ABOUT THE BOOK: A RELUCTANT QUEEN
An inspiring re-imagining of the tale of Esther, a young Jewish woman thrust from a life of obscurity into a life of power, wealth, intrigue . . . and tender love.
See the story of Esther in an entirely new way-with all the political intrigue and tension you remember, but told as a passionate and tender love story between a young man and woman. Misunderstood by many, King Xerxes was a powerful but lonely man. Esther's beauty caught the eye of the young king, but it was her spirit that captured his heart.
Imagine anew the story of Esther, one of our faith's great heroines, destined to play a key role in the history of Christianity. Click here for more!
ABOUT THE AUTHOR, JOAN WOLF: Joan Wolf was born in New York City but has lived most of her adult life with her husband in Connecticut, where she raised two children and countless numbers of assorted animals. Joan is the author of numerous historical novels including The Road to Avalon which Publishers Weekly lauded as “historical fiction at its finest.”
For more about Joan and her other books, please visit: (I cannot get the link to work at all, so I apologize for having to write it this way) www (dot) joan wolf (dot) com. Go ahead and type in the address as you normally would, not as I did. There is a hiccup today in my Blog that is not allowing HTML for some reason.
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