Reviews with content warning for Miscarriage - The Book of Longings

I listened to the audiobook and it was a great read - highly engaging and thoughtful. The story follows Anna, the fictional wife of Jesus, and highlights the challenges and triumphs of being a woman in biblical times, particularly one who has a desire for knowledge and a life of her own. I loved Anna’s character and found myself relating to her even though her experiences were so different from my own. I also enjoyed the depiction of Jesus and the way Anna’s story was woven into historical facts of his life.

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emberysing's review against another edition

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emotional hopeful inspiring reflective slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

personally, it means a lot to me to read such a beautiful story get to the heart of my spirituality without traditional restraints. and it’s women! women women women finally in the narrative telling their stories their way! honestly, I have been starved of reading about women in this kind of spiritual context and <b>what for</b>.

overall this just isn’t my type of story, and I couldn’t really connect to the main characters as much as I would’ve liked to have. but there’s a lot of heart in the story. it’s wonderful storytelling.

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v171's review against another edition

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adventurous emotional hopeful inspiring reflective relaxing sad slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

2.0

What's the book version of Oscar bait? Pulitzer bait? What ever it is, this book is that. It was a very charming story, and emotional at times, but I couldn't help but feel that it was, as another reviewer put it, bible fan fiction. And I don't know that the author would necessarily disagree with that. The authors note was very honest and insightful into her concerns and thinking when deciding whether to write this story, and I found that refreshing to hear. I enjoyed how the characters were written and the over arching story was an interesting one.

But with that being said, I still just can't get over the thought that this was an easy capitalization on creating a feminist bible story, filled with headstrong, flawless women and modern motivations. I'm torn on the purpose of this story. It is clearly centered on Ana, the wife of Jesus, but it is so focused on her that Jesus is not present for the vast majority of the book. He only exists as someone to be, well, longed after off screen (off page?). One might argue that is the purpose of the story: focus on Ana as Jesus already has his own story. But to that, my response would be -- why make it about Jesus at all? What additional insights were we supposed to walk away with by making this a Jesus love story that he was hardly present in?

Would this have been a stronger story if it was not about the bible? No, probably not. As historical fiction, it fell flat because the characters felt far too modern, so maybe the only way to salvage it WAS to associate it with the bible. But I also didn't feel that this story challenged the reader to reconsider how they approach Christian texts. It was literally just bible fan fiction.

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katieritoch's review against another edition

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challenging emotional inspiring reflective slow-paced

Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? N/A
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.5

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sammieiris's review against another edition

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adventurous hopeful inspiring reflective medium-paced

Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? No

5.0

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