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Summary: Not what you might expect! It's better!
Review: The Red Tent is the story of Dinah, a lesser known character from the book of Genesis in the bible. The Red Tents illuminates what life was like in this early century for women. It has tales of love, betrothal, marriage, birth, menstruation and death.The story is told in Dinah's voice and begins with the story of her four mothers and her father, Jacob. Dinah tells of each of the traits that she learned and inherited from each of her mothers. The book then finishes the tale of Dinah's life as she leaves her family's homeland first by choice in search of love and skill of midwifery and then by revenge and hatred of the very men she called brothers. Do not be scared away from this book thinking it is all biblical. It is an excellent FICTIONAL novel that tells a wonderful story.
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Summary: Wonderfully empowering book!
Review: Having been assigned this book in a women's literature class, I was sure I didn not want to read it. Hesitantly, I opened the cover. I was instantly drawn away into the story of Dinah, her four mothers, and the red tent. Theit sisterhood during their times in the red tent is absolutly inspiring. It is a wonderfully descriptive book and I couldn't put it down. I finished it, thoroughly satisfied, in a day and a half. It weaves a tale that is like no other I have read. It is a roller coaster of emotion as is the daily life of anyone who is intune with themselves, their family, and nature around them. It is a thoroughly enjoyable read, and good to the last drop!
Rating: 
Summary: Interesting but biblically inaccurate
Review: I was at first fascinated with the storytelling in this book. Riveted by the perspective of a woman in ancient biblical times I was eager to read more. However, having studied the lives of Isaac, Jacob, and Joseph quite a bit, I began noticing that Anita took a lot of liberties with the accounting of biblical history. In my opinion at book based on the Bible should at least remain true to the facts around which the story is centered. From the love professed between Leah and Jacob to the character of Joseph I found that she dramatically distorted the truth to serve the purposes of her story. I think the story is well written and in any other context (non-biblical) I would have thoroughly enjoyed the book as a great story and a great character. She needed to have found another setting for her character of Dinah to retain her credibility as an author. I don't think I will be reading any more of her bible character based stories.
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Summary: Review of Audio Production Only
Review: Who decided some of the most disturbing stories of all time (We're talking just as troubling as "Salo" or "Caligula" here!!) should be read with all the bizarre (almost perverse) cheeriness of a muffin ad?!! This isn't a margerine ad or a ring around the collar treatment-it ruins the whole story-you're so transported by this manipulative ad tone that you lose the story somehow! Where do they find these people?
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Summary: The Red Tent
Review: This is a truly masterful book that embodies the role that women might have played in biblical times. The story of Dinah and her aunts is absolutely magical. It show that true bonds that women can have with eachother through childbirth and sisterhood. When reading The Red Tent, one really feels like the characters come alive and you have known them their entire lives. Anita Diamant has done an excellent job capturing the reader and taking them on a marvelous journey with Dinah. A must read for women!
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Summary: The Humanity of the Bible
Review: This may be the most beautiful book that I have ever read. It is the story of Jacob's family from Genesis (about chapters 29 through 50) as told through the voice of Dinah, the only daughter of Jacob. We hear little of Dinah in the finished product of Genesis. The story goes that she is raped by the prince of Shechem, and her father, Jacob is offered a hefty brideprice from the king, but demands that all the men of Shechem be circumsized. Surprisingly, they agree and all the men, including King and prince, go under the knife. On the third day of their recovery, the sons of Jacob slaughter all of the men of Shechem and plunder the city. We hear nothing else about Dinah. It's a disconcerting story and it leaves me begging for all the behind-the-scenes details that the Bible leaves out. There happens to be a Jewish tradition called Midrash where the imaginations of God's people fill in the blanks that the Bible leaves us. Anita Diamant follows in this tradition and makes a remarkable contribution to it. The Red Tent is a very human perspective of the biblical story, bringing to life the polytheistic culture and their connection and dependence to the things of the earth. It imagines possible motivations, reactions, emotions, and relationships of the family that are left out of the biblical telling of the story. The "red tent" is meeting place for the women of the family during the "new moon" of their menstruation and it is an image of the strong sense of womanhood that is celebrated in the book. It is refreshing to hear the biblical story from a woman's voice. After reading it, I told my wife I feel like I understand her better. I was a biblical studies major at Messiah College and this major gave me a more human understanding of the Bible, knowing that the authors were the people of God trying to interpret their own history. This point of view helps me deal with a lot of disconcerting passages in the Hebrew Bible/Old Testament such as Dinah's tale. The Red Tent gives me a story which adds vision and imagination to this point of view. It is artfully written and reading it was to be a participant in something beautiful.
Rating: 
Summary: Fanciful and Long
Review: Although this was an entertaining novel, I think that the third section could have been left out entirely. It dragged on far too long, and did not really accomplish anything. Overall it was too fictionalized to even be half believable, otherwise I might have enjoyed it more.
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Summary: My favorite book of all time
Review: To me, I know I've read a truly good book when I have a hard time coming back to reality after I've read it. This is one of those books that I became so absorbed in that I lived it. And I re-live it each time I reread it. I'm sad that I have to come back to my own world each time I finish it.
Diamant has done an excellent job turning a few unemotional biblical details into a novel that captures the flavor of the historical time it covers, particularly from a woman's perspective - but also just in general. It is to me a clear case of fiction being truer than fact. The characters come alive, have personalities and motivations that you just can't discern from the biblical version.
While it differs from the biblical story in many details, this actually alerted me to things I had missed in the Old Testament version of the story - the teraphim, the handmaidens... as well as giving me the perspective: "Hey, I never thought of it that way, and I bet it did happen like that back then!".
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Summary: Finished in no time!
Review: This book had been recommended to me by many friends, I finally got to read it, and was quickly emersed. The book was insightful for anyone. The book, is not a story about religion but a story about women.
Rating:
Summary: Intriguing look into the world of women
Review: This book is excellent and tells a fascinating tale of the women from the beginning of the bible. I highly recommend it.
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