Rating: 
Summary: Appealing and Compassionate
Review: Although this story is set in an Orthodox Jewish Community, I think the theme of an outsider bringing change to a community is universal. In this poignant story of the widow Batsheva impact on a very small and insulated Jewish community in the South, Tova Mirvis explores the problems of maintaining traditions, while still being open to different ways of looking at these traditions. Although many of the 'ladies' can appear gossipy, interfering or unkind, they are struggling to keep their lives the same, and safe. We can get angry with them, but a small part of us can also identify with this need to have things stay the way they have always been. Batsheva herself is not drawn as a perfect character, but as a real person, struggling with her identity, and her real need to be accepted by the community she has chosen to live in. At times I laughed, shook my head in wonder, or cried, but I was never not affected by this book. This is Ms. Mirvis' first novel. Here's to many more.
Rating: 
Summary: Life among Southern Jews
Review: This was truly a memorable read made all the more so since a few weeks after reading this book, I listened to the author speak about this book in person.
Like the characters from The Ladies Auxiliaryairy, Tova Mirvis was raised in the Orthodox community of Memphis, Tennessee. And like some of the younger characters from this book, the reader wonders how much Ms. Mirvis questions the way she was raised among Orthodox Jews and their strict compliance to their religion.
The Ladies Auxiliary opens as the women of a suburban Memphis community prepare for the Sabbath or Shabbat, the holiest of days among Jews the world over. Into their midst, arrives Batsheva, a new neighbor. For this is no ordinary new arrival, but the young widow of a former resident of the communtity who comes with a daughter. As if that doesn't set them apart enough, Batsheva is also a convert. Almost from the beginning Batsheva seems different than the other women. It is almost as if she forgets everything they hold in high regard. How can a young woman question what the Laws of Moses and study of Torah (which only the men can do)has taught these women? Batsheva sets herself apart from the religious women and this community in the manner of her dress, compliance to certain household traditions and her attitude towards the other women. But worst of all, Bartsheva goes so far as to question rituals in the synagogue and a woman's right to participate in services. What Batsheva fails to realize is that in her own way she's having an effect on some of the congregation particularly the young Orthodox women she teaches. More importantly, the Rabbis son home from his Rabbinical studies for the summer, spends way too much time talking to Batsheva. Its only a matter of time before he also begins to question these religious ways, his interest in becoming a Rabbi and his ability to faithfully lead a congregation. And what the ladies of the auxiliary gradually suspected about Batsheva is happening before their eyes. Not only is Batsheva questioning their ways but somehow beginning to change their children and even themselves. And they cannot allow this to continue. Finally, how Batsheva with her visions of growth and change, and the ladies auxiliary with their time honored traditions will finally come to terms with each other is the stunning climax of this book. This is the first book by an author who certainly knows her material first hand and gives life to her characters. The ladies of this community are microcosms of many women each of us may know. They interfere, they're concerned, they tell tales, they mean well while they hurt other women, they want to eat foods which their religion forbids, they're funny, overwhelmed by their husbands and children, witty and humorous, repressed and sometimes sad. You can laugh at them, nod you're head in agreement with them or astonishment at their views, you may even know them or you may even be them. But you will never forget them or Batsheva. For it is the ladies of the auxiliary and Batsheva who form the very fabric and importance of this book. And the real strength of Tova Mirvis' book is in her portrayal of Batsheva, a wowan who forces the women and men of this community to hold up a mirror to themselves and question what they truly believe is important to them.
In the tradition of The Chosen and The Promise by Chaim Potok, Tova Mirvis allows her readers to enter the world of Orthodox Jews living and worshipping in a Southern communtiy. And it is a world we know much better after reading The Ladies Auxilary. Nwo I look forward to reading more titles by her in the future. Shalom!
Rating:
Summary: Why I love The Ladies Auxillary
Review: This book warmed my heart and soul. I loved the mother daughter relationship. I loved the sense of community.
Rating:
Summary: I cried when I lost this book on the plane
Review: The Ladies' Auxiliary is a very absorbing story. The descriptions are so realistic. The main character Batsheva is mysterious and captivating. I couldn't stop reading about her. She also had the "Ruth mystique" as a convert to Judaism. There's something wonderous about an adult who chooses to study Torah and convert to Judaism. I didn't find the story funny as it was described on the back cover. It was painfully realistic when it came to the gossip of the small town women. In some ways the story reminds me of the film and movie "Chocolat" and how difficult it is for an outsider who moves into a small town. I must say I was disappointed with the ending. The whole story felt as though it were building and that some revelation would occur at the end. Instead, the ending is more subtle. Batsheva remained chaste and observant and had put all the other women to shame. Yet, why would a woman like Batsheva want to live in a community such as this one in the first place?
Rating: 
Summary: Should I even bother to finish?
Review: I grew up Catholic in a Mississippi town full of Southern Babtists. I attended a liberal college and grad school and consider myself well equipped to evaluate a book about a woman in the south whose basic beliefs are in line with her peers, as long as you don't examine the details too closely and of course, don't dare to actually SPEAK about the differences out loud. This book started out great, but as I am 3/4 of the way finished, I find that I have gotton bored with it. It has become very predictable and too narrow in scope. I actually think that Mirvis' approach to "point of view" takes away from the book--we are so busy cataloging what every person thinks or says about the same "action" or "event" in the book that we don't have enough things happening. I would love to have some flash backs to the main character's past, to have some segments of contrast to the mundane Memphis life. I realize that depicting the hum-drum routine is part of the point, but as a work attempting to entertain, the book needs to offer some relief ---as well to as to make Batsheva more "real" by giving us her own memories of what shaped her.
Rating:
Summary: Food for Thought
Review: This book was filled with the foods and rituals and traditions that bind the Memphis Orthodox community together, or, in Batsheva's case, contribute to her exclusion. I found the discription of the women's commitment to perfection in their completion of the expected rituals, and the tedium they found in all the many details of their daily life very thought provoking. The thing that I found most striking, though, was the recognition I felt of this excluding, insular community. This is, in my experience, a very clear and recognizable presentation of what it is like to move to many small, Southern towns and try to be accepted. Having been there and tried that, I can attest to the myth of Southern hospitality exposed by this novel, and the Orthodox Jewish community could be anywhere in the Bible Belt.
Rating:
Summary: The Ladies Auxiliary
Review: This book is amazing! You really get swept into the characters lives and feel for the main characters. As a Jew working with Jews-by-Choice and interfaith couples, I find the response of the "Ladies" to be realistic and unfortunate.
Rating:
Summary: Very much worth reading
Review: Tova Mirvis captures perfectly the pettiness and spiritual damage that can occur in an insular small-minded community. Although this is a painful topic, this book is a great and uplifting read. Mirvis' characters are wonderfully drawn, quite real and often sympathetic, despite their shortcomings. Batsheva, a convert moves to the Memphis Orthodox community. Batsheva approaches Judaism with an infectious spirituality, unfamiliar to the community which -- until this point -- had judged each other's degree of religiosity by external appearance and adherence to rote ritual. The community becomes increasingly suspicious about Batsheva and the suspense will keep you riveted -- are the suspicions justified or not? As the story is resolved, it is very gratifying to see that the community starts to "get it" -- to understand the danger of a parochial view and the damage this view can inflict on the very people it deigns to protect. I was once a member of a similar community and left in large part due to the tensions that Mirvis so beautifully describes. Another nice point this book makes is that the religious are not always the best representatives of a religion. I very much look forward to Mirvis' next book.
Rating: 
Summary: Sophomoric and Saccharine
Review: A positive view of the Orthodox community? Come on! These women - even Batsheva, the "heroine," a convert who dares to dress and think a little differently and maybe even sinned once or twice in her almost forgotten past - are narrow, petty, nosy, gossiping, lamebrained. As characters in a novel they are predictable and banal. If I lived in a "community" like the one depicted I would run away, too. The writing is childlike and plodding and overly saccharine; hardly a biting satire. And the plot? A teenager leaves home and so does the rabbi's son, and finally some people realize it's not the fault of the iconoclastic outsider. Please! Find another creative writing program. I wonder sometimes: with all the good writing going on, how does something like this get published?
Rating: 
Summary: Catch a glimpse of a different lifestyle
Review: The book earned three stars because it taught me something. I got a glimpse of Orthodox Jewish traditions and beliefs, a religon I know little about. But the story wasn't engaging. I didn't find the heroine very interesting and the plot didn't provide much of a hook.
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