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sterling8 's review for:
The Dovekeepers
by Alice Hoffman
I was ready to give this book 5 stars and make it a book club recommendation halfway through. But then the next 300 pages dulled my enthusiasm somewhat.
The plot fleshes out the historical events at Masada, a Jewish fortress at which the defenders committed mass suicide rather than submit to the Romans. I knew nothing about this story, and was interested to find out more about this bizarre and tragic event.
So, you probably know by now that the book is told through the viewpoint of four different women. Each woman has an affinity for an element: fire, air, metal and water. I liked this idea and wish that it had played out better- metal, especially, seemed like a stretch and the girl did not fit personality-wise with her element. But then part of the book's weakness was that each character sounded like the same person. I think that if the author had stuck with Yael, she would have had a stronger story. Yael was a good character, and the author did a good job exposing her blind spots through others' reaction to her. She was a central character, and we could have seen just about everything that mattered in the story through her eyes. The book might have been tighter, too.
The last character, Shirah, was especially ruined by my reading of her perspective. Through other eyes, she was a powerful, mysterious, magical woman. But really she was someone who, as a young girl, had been taken advantage of by a cousin too weak to keep her, and for whom she later ruined the lives of her entire family. Co-dependent doesn't even begin to cover it.
I did like the flavor of the book- the evocative language and magical realism style. The book reminded me that ancient Jews had a very different culture and perspective. From them came the Zealots- they were not afraid of violence. It built beautiful imagery.
So- a bit too long, perhaps because of the unnecessary perspectives. The plot rushed at the end- the death of the fortress. It was hard to understand exactly what was happening, and we've depended on the author to build this world for us and take us this far.
But it was also a beautiful, if grim, read.
The plot fleshes out the historical events at Masada, a Jewish fortress at which the defenders committed mass suicide rather than submit to the Romans. I knew nothing about this story, and was interested to find out more about this bizarre and tragic event.
So, you probably know by now that the book is told through the viewpoint of four different women. Each woman has an affinity for an element: fire, air, metal and water. I liked this idea and wish that it had played out better- metal, especially, seemed like a stretch and the girl did not fit personality-wise with her element. But then part of the book's weakness was that each character sounded like the same person. I think that if the author had stuck with Yael, she would have had a stronger story. Yael was a good character, and the author did a good job exposing her blind spots through others' reaction to her. She was a central character, and we could have seen just about everything that mattered in the story through her eyes. The book might have been tighter, too.
The last character, Shirah, was especially ruined by my reading of her perspective. Through other eyes, she was a powerful, mysterious, magical woman. But really she was someone who, as a young girl, had been taken advantage of by a cousin too weak to keep her, and for whom she later ruined the lives of her entire family. Co-dependent doesn't even begin to cover it.
I did like the flavor of the book- the evocative language and magical realism style. The book reminded me that ancient Jews had a very different culture and perspective. From them came the Zealots- they were not afraid of violence. It built beautiful imagery.
So- a bit too long, perhaps because of the unnecessary perspectives. The plot rushed at the end- the death of the fortress. It was hard to understand exactly what was happening, and we've depended on the author to build this world for us and take us this far.
But it was also a beautiful, if grim, read.