- Paperback: 336 pages
- Publisher: Ballantine Books; 7th edition (Sep 5 2000)
- Language: English
- ISBN-10: 0345441265
- ISBN-13: 978-0345441263
- Product Dimensions: 14.1 x 1.8 x 21.1 cm
- Shipping Weight: 299 g
- Average Customer Review: 4.1 out of 5 stars See all reviews (88 customer reviews)
- Amazon Bestsellers Rank: #150,356 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
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Product Details |
Product Description
From Publishers Weekly
The world of this confident, insightful debut novel is the tightly knit Orthodox Jewish community of Memphis, Tenn., a social structure that unravels when an unconventional New York convert settles there with her five-year-old daughter. Newly widowed Batsheva Jacobs is both shockingly modern and fervently spiritual. She lovingly raises her daughter, Ayala, in the Orthodox tradition, but she sings loudly and enthusiastically at shul (perhaps a sign of unseemly ego), visits the mikvah to cleanse herself (an act that raises eyebrows, since she has no husband), and she wears flowing clothes that show her figureAall of which is noted suspiciously by the local women whose common goal is to preserve tradition. In Memphis, where Shabbos dinner includes fried chicken and black-eyed peas, that task isn't easy. Taking a job as art teacher at the girls' school, blonde, green-eyed Batsheva is soon a beloved confidante of the community's female teenagers, but when she allows them to wear makeup and miniskirts on a ski trip, and becomes close to the Rabbi's beloved 22-year-old son, she's the subject of cruel gossip. After one of her students runs away with a non-Jewish, older boyfriend, Batsheva is blamed. The narrator, one of the housewives fiercely protective of the insular community, tells the story in third-person plural: "little changed in this city where we have always lived"Aa statement rendered untrue, of course, as the community breaks into discord. Caught in the middle are Ayala and the respected and goodhearted Mimi Rubin, the rabbi's wife, who begins to believe rumors about her son's attachment to Batsheva, and panics. Generous with humor and compassion, Mirvis paints tenderly nuanced portraits of strong female characters while scrutinizing an entrenched religious subculture whose traditions are threatened by modern temptations. Guilt, passion, prejudice, loneliness and independenceAcommon themes in Jewish literatureAare explored with sensitivity in a gentle story that captures its milieu with tolerant understanding, and plucks the heartstrings. Agent, Nicole Aragi. 7-city author tour. (Oct.)
Copyright 1999 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.
Copyright 1999 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.
From Library Journal
Life in Memphis's Orthodox community is as it always has been, until a free-spirited widow arrives with her young daughter. Now alone in the world, Batsheva is looking for a close-knit community and has heard that Memphis, the hometown of her late husband, is pleasant. Uninhibited and artistic, she raises suspicion immediately among the Orthodox women in the community. A convert to Judaism, Batsheva observes the holidays and rituals with more joy and abandon than some believe appropriate. When she becomes the art teacher at the Jewish school, the teenage girls finally have a sympathetic ear. Unfortunately, their rebelliousness and the decision of the rabbi's son to leave yeshiva have to be blamed on someone. As the outsider, Batsheva becomes a scapegoat for all the ills in the community. A well-wrought tale of fear and intolerance that is universal.AKimberly G. Allen, MCI Corporate Information Resources Ctr., Washington, DC
Copyright 1999 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.
Copyright 1999 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.
Inside This Book
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First Sentence
BEFORE BATSHEVA MOVED TO Memphis, our community was the safest place on earth, close, small, held together like a carefully crocheted sweater. Read the first page
Front Cover | Copyright | Excerpt
BEFORE BATSHEVA MOVED TO Memphis, our community was the safest place on earth, close, small, held together like a carefully crocheted sweater. Read the first page
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Most helpful customer reviews
5.0 out of 5 stars
Gossip is never idle,
By A Customer
This review is from: The Ladies Auxiliary (Paperback)
Near the end of this novel there is a marvelous lesson about gossip. A woman who has damaged another person's reputation with gossip goes to her rabbi and asks him how she can take back the harm she has done. The rabbi tells her to take a feather pillow to the top of a hill and rip it open. The woman does this and returns to the rabbi. He then tells her to go back to the hilltop and collect every feather and put it back in the pillow. "But, Rabbi! That is impossible!" she tells him. He then replies yes, it is and such is the case with gossip. Once the harmful words have been spoken they cannot be taken back.This is a wonderful novel about a close-knit religious community and the suspicion and fear that envelops it when an outsider moves in. The fact that this outsider is a young and very attractive widow only adds fuel to the fire. Ms. Tovis pulls no punches here in her depiction of the viciousness of gossip and how devastating it is not only for the victims but for the ones who participate in it. An excellent story with a lot of detailed descriptions of Jewish family life and Jewish holidays. I loved it.
4.0 out of 5 stars
An outstanding study of the evil women do,
By
This review is from: The Ladies Auxiliary (Paperback)
Fantastic! An excellent study of the evil women do.Batsheva, a young widow, moves into a very small Orthodox Jewish community in Memphis. As an unmarried woman and a stranger, she is instantly the subject of gossip and speculation. As a convert, her enthusiastic love of Judiasm is suspect---in a community where ritual and rigid obedience to the law has replaced a love for religion and/or God. The women in the community are highly individualized and therefore, easily recognizable. They are women we all know and they can be found everywhere in Amrica. There is a Mrs. Levy (the gossip who always begins everything with "I don't want say anything bad BUT...") in every community---just as there is a Helen (the woman who blindly follows others because she is afraid to discover who she really is), a Tzipporah (a woman convinced of her righteousness) and a Rena (a woman struggling to hide her own secrets). The characters are fantastic. Buy this and share it with all the women you know.
1.0 out of 5 stars
The Unkindest Cut of All,
By
This review is from: The Ladies Auxiliary (Paperback)
The monthly book club selection sounded like a real find. I looked forward to reading this crosscultural award winning selection about my Hebrew brethren. I plunged in with great enthusiasm. Like a swim through whipped cream. Instead I was faced with a cast of thoroughly despicable characters with a starry eyed heroine at the helm. The conflict started right away between the Orthodoxy of Judaism and the vehemence of an outsider trying to get in. The battle lines drawn it was no surprise to know who prevails. This is an miserable read
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