Lois T. Henderson (–1973)

Pivotal in the life of the prophet Moses is his older sister in Miriam by author Lois T. Henderson.

Back when I was younger, I rather liked this older ChristFic book. Although I couldn't fully connect with its flow back then, I enjoyed it much as I would other stories that gave this historical/period fiction lover an engaging sense of another time and place.

Nowadays, I don't always enjoy biblical fiction as much as I once did. I used to take many Bible stories and details for granted, partly because I heard them so often. But now when I actually stop and give them deeper thought rather than just ingest them, they hit differently.

I'm no longer that comfortable as I read a story where the women are viewed and treated as subservient to men, and blatantly so. There's a difference between a narrative that presents such subservience as something up for serious questioning or a challenge, and a story like this one, where the subservience is written as either the proper way or pretty much "just the way it is" for the characters. And while it also wasn't my first time feeling a sense of tragedy concerning the legendary account of plagues sweeping through Egypt, it struck me in a new way to imagine a scenario with untold numbers of children, including babies, suffering the effects of divinely orchestrated disasters.

I won't go further into that here, but no. I don't take that kind of thing for granted anymore.

Also, it isn't as easy as it once was for me to read novels with unlikable protagonists. I realize Miriam's flaws are an intentional aspect of the plot, and through much of the story, she isn't presented as over the top. Still, aside from the fact that her changeful moods are sometimes difficult to follow, she's prideful, irritable, jealous, resentful, selfish, and racist. She gradually worsens until about the last ten pages of the book.

I think that being able to connect with lead characters, rather than merely reading about the interesting events in their lives, is more important to me now than it was in the past. I didn't connect with this story's heroine.

Even so, the novel's style has more of a natural feel than other older ChristFic books I've read. And I think it's worth it for me to revisit certain books to get a better sense of my overall, ongoing journey as a reader.… (mehr)