One review called this book "SAD", another "INACCURATE" and I think what is truly sad and inaccurate is the attitude that these reviewers displayed. It is clear to me that the problem they have is not with this book but with the religion.
The point of this book is to show how families of women who converted to Islam have been affected by their daughters' choices. It is not meant to justify or criticize these choices - just to present them as food for thought and discussion. I think it is the author's hope that her book will open doors of understanding between those daughters and their families so that they can do what families do best - give each other unconditional love and support.
A particular strength of this book is that the women who responded to the survey represent a broad sample of women converts to Islam. I think this is an important contribution because it helps to break the stereotype that women converting to Islam do it only because of their husband's coercion or because they are "lost souls". The book shows that between the two extremes there are many intelligent and open-minded women who have independently chosen the path of Islam.
The only reason I did not give this book 5 stars is because I felt there could have been more input from Muslim women in the *analysis* of the responses. At times it felt like the book was kind of a cut and paste job, with the author's comments here and there.
I think it would also have been a better book had Anway gotten a broader range of input from Islamic scholars on the doctrinal information that she included. I felt that she presented Islam as having a rather narrow/definitive system of beliefs - and those familiar with Islam know that there is a great deal of variation among the scholars and the believers. In fact, the responses to her survey clearly show that the "other path" chosen by these women is not one path, but many paths going in the same direction.
