Customer Reviews

Pillar of Fire

5 star:		(9)
4 star:		(4)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(4)

 

 

(Not that I have figured out what a "craw" is, though.)

When I first read this book, I enjoyed it. Not awesomely great, but definitely page-turningly good. What is interesting, though, is that it has yet to leave my mind after more than four years. Any time I hear of, or read about, anything to do with Moses, I'm immediately transported back to "Pillar of Fire" and wonder... It is a provocative novel that has true staying power.

I think that Ms. Tarr is a good writer (her Avaryan Rising series was great!) but her genre is fantasy, not historic fiction. Fantasy has lots of room for imagination. Pillar of Fire, on the other hand, employs characters who lived and breathed. Since this is not my first book on Ancient Egypt, I had a chance to compare. Unfortunately, Pillar of Fire loses to to just about any Egyptian book that came my way.

First of all I did not buy Nofret: a slave, especially a woman, who dared to utter a word to the Princess or Pharaoh would have been dead that very moment. Feminism is a good thing, but not when you write about a slave in ancient Egypt...

Second, I don't think that Pharaoh marrying his daughters could have caused outrage because it was a custom for kings both before and after Akhenaten. (What about Akhenaten marrying his mother Tiye -- this was not even mentioned in the book)

Finally, I did not buy the Akhenaten - Moses theory. I don't think I have to go into detail on that (couple hundred years too early, maybe...)

The bottom line: read The Twelfth Transforming by Pauline Gedge for a MUCH more satisfying book on this subject.

This book is really interesting. I am right now doing a unit study on Ancient Egypt, and my Mom got this for me from the library. Anyway, this would have to be the best Ancient Egyptian book I have read. I recommend it for readers who are mature though, younger readers may not understand some of the content. I enjoy how Ms. Tarr weaves the story, with many interesting facts in between. I also like how 'Nofret' (a Hittite slave girl) and I think many of the same things about the Pharoah's actions. I recommend this book to all of my friends!

"Nofret" is a young Hittite girl, taken captive and sold into slavery, given as tribute to the royal family of ancient Egypt. It would have been very easy for her to despair of life, but there is no taint of surrender, anywhere in her character. By the middle of this novel, she is chief of servants and closest confidante to Egypt's royal princess, daughter of the enigmatic Pharaoh Akenaten. By its end she has made a whole new life for herself, and witnessed sweeping events of history.
Judith Tarr is without peer in her ability to build believable characters, with real human feelings, virtues and failings. "Pillar Of Fire" places these people's lives in a fascinating time of history, and builds an intriguing possible bridge between that history and certain events of the Bible's Old Testament. Another great five star work by Ms Tarr!

I first read this book 9 years ago when I was 14 and something about it really clicked with me. I loved the characters and (being a 14 year old girl) really liked the love story between Johanan and Nofret. Very provocative stuff!! I re-read it last week and think that some of Tarr's writing is a little clunky, but she gets her point across, and throws in good amounts of detail in the process. She certainly did her research. I didn't love it as much as I did at 14, but it was still enjoyable.

I have read the reviews where people say "moses and akenaten lived 100 years apart" and to that all I have to say is that even egyptologists admit that dating is rather difficult when dealing with history as ancient as egyptian. All the records of this man, his wife, and family were totally, utterly, and completely destroyed because he went so against the grain (they found his stuff used as filler for other pharaoh's monuments and projects... they hated him and tried to erase him from memory. a very ancient egyption thing to do). No one living today was there at that time, and for all we know, they could have been the same person. Do I think they were? No... but knowing that history is extremely murky during the 18th dynasty makes a suspension of disbelief rather easy. It is not something to get angry about as many people who reviewed this book have done.

This is an enjoyable read if you are not so narrow-minded as to cling blindly to reasons why it is impossible... and are able to look past some of the clunky passages :)

I ordered this book because it was highly recommended by one of your readers in his review of another book..(that's one of the things I look for in reviews).

The main character, Nofret, was one of the most interesting of any I've read. She has stayed with me. I find myself thinking "What would Nofret do?"

The book was lengthy, but I was sorry to see such good reading end. The same reviewer also recommended Byzantium by S. Lawhead, which I am reading..and it is also a compelling read.

So, in keeping with recommendations, if you have not read Dear and Glorious Physician by Taylor Caldwell, it is a masterpiece of depecting St. Luke's character and the time in which he lived. I have read this one several times.

Happy Trails

This is one wild story and I loved it - the idea she uses of who Moses was is just plain fun, in my opinion. I discovered Judith Tarr at the local library, just eyeballing the shelves, and she is now one of my favorite writers. I've read this one twice and will buy my own so I can read it again.

Tarr does it again, although this is not my favorite of her titles. That honor is reserved for A Wind in Cairo. Here Tarr takes an historical setting, peoples it with original versions of well-researched characters, and runs with it. I found this a long and rich story, but I got impatient towards the end. I don't think it dragged. I think I was just impatient, especially as I basically knew what was going to happen, just not how, exactly.

I like that she includes author's notes at the end, about her reference material and sources for the more controversial theories, and that so much of it does indeed exist in serious scholarship. I found the main characters to be well fleshed out and sympathetic. I am definitely left with the desire to learn more about the historical Hittites, after spending so much time with the first-person narrator, Nofret, who served first a princess then that princess as a queen, and beyond. There was much uncertainty and there were limitations in the points of view, and that is so true in life as well. The theory of Akhenaten as Moshe (Moses) felt far-fetched to me, but apparently that was not Tarr's invention, only something that she found useful for use in her story. Much of what a reader might "blame" on Tarr's Muse does, in this book and in others, come from her painstaking research which uncovers lesser-known theories. It is to her credit as a writer that she can take such material and weave it into such a tale of what might have been.

I'd recommend this to people who might be comfortable with writers taking liberties with history as it is portrayed in the Bible. People who like books by Jane Auel, Anna Waldo, and others who write sort of romantic historical fiction might enjoy this book.

This is the first of Tarr's novels I have read. I found the storyline to be wonderfully transporting. Her characters are believable, and her descriptions allow you to experience life in ancient Egypt. My only problem with this work is the language, or perhaps I should say grammar: Some sentences simply don't make sense. I am inclined, however, to believe these to be typographical errors, and they don't detract from the story. Altogether this is a very believable tale about the "heretic" Pharoh Akenaten and his family and household. Definitely worth the paperback price tag!

I am also a first time reader of Tarr, and as a lover of Egypt and it's history, she really made me feel like I had actually lived through the things that happened. Although, as mentioned above, there were some sentences that just didn't "click", but I also believe those to be just typographical errors. As a novice to the wonders of ancient Egypt, I really felt like this book provided me with mostly valid and wonderful information. She really made the characters come alive, and overall, the book(in my opinion), was HUGE success. I'd love to see more written as this one was. Thanks!