Abigail's Story: A Novel (Women of the Bible)

Abigail's Story: A Novel by Ann Burton


My rating: 4 of 5 stars
Ann Burton has taken the few sentences about Abigail in the Bible and turned it into an inspiring story that might have been. We aren't given a lot of details in the Bible, but what facts there are have been skillfully woven into a story which depicts the lives of the people of the era in a way we can all identify.

Abigail is an only daughter who has to offer herself in marriage to an odious and greedy man in order to pay off her wastrel brother's debts to keep him and her elderly parents from being sold off into slavery. She is send off to the hill country the day after her marriage to manage the wild herdsmen in preparation for the annual accounting. When she arrives she finds an almost unlivable cottage with virtually no roof and starving herdsmen whose lives have been made miserable by her greedy husband. As she comes to know these people, her heart goes out to them and she travels back to her husband to obtain food to keep them from starving. At the same time, she meets and befriends the outlaw shepherd, David, who is to become King of Israel.

What I liked most was the way Biblical events came alive in this story. The author doesn't pretend that this is what happened, but it could have happened.

View all my reviews >>