Discover millions of ebooks, audiobooks, and so much more with a free trial

Only $11.99/month after trial. Cancel anytime.

Unavailable
Eve: A Novel of the First Woman
Unavailable
Eve: A Novel of the First Woman
Unavailable
Eve: A Novel of the First Woman
Audiobook15 hours

Eve: A Novel of the First Woman

Rating: 3 out of 5 stars

3/5

()

Currently unavailable

Currently unavailable

About this audiobook

In their world they are alone…a family haunted by banishment, struggling for survival in a harsh new land. A woman who has borne and buried children, Eve sees danger shadowing those she loves, while her husband drifts further and further from the man he was in the Garden, blinded by his need to rebuild a life outside of Eden. One daughter, alluring, self-absorbed Naava, turns away from their beliefs. Another, crippled, ever-faithful Aya, harbors a fateful secret, while brothers Cain and Abel become adversaries, and Dara, the youngest, is chosen for a fate of her own.



In one hot, violent summer, by the shores of the muddy Euphrates, strangers arrive on their land. New gods challenge their own. And for Eve, a time of reckoning is at hand. The woman who once tasted the forbidden fruit of paradise sees her family unraveling-as brother turns on brother, culminating in a confrontation that will have far-reaching consequences for them all.



From a woman's first awakening to a mother's innermost hopes and fears, from moments of exquisite tenderness to a climax of shocking violence, Eve takes us on a breathtaking journey of the imagination. A novel that has it all-romantic love, lust, cruelty, heroism, envy, sacrifice, murder-Eve is a work of mesmerizing literary invention.

LanguageEnglish
Release dateJan 27, 2009
ISBN9781423378525
Unavailable
Eve: A Novel of the First Woman

Related to Eve

Related audiobooks

Historical Fiction For You

View More

Related articles

Reviews for Eve

Rating: 2.8846155512820513 out of 5 stars
3/5

78 ratings18 reviews

What did you think?

Tap to rate

Review must be at least 10 words

  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    I actually finished this book a few weeks ago, and wish I'd written my review earlier while my thoughts were fresh in my head. My feelings about this book were a little mixed at times. Sometimes I found the book to be a bit cliche, and the story uninteresting. But then there were other parts when I just loved the writing and the thoughts of the characters. There were many times I loved the depiction of the Garden of Eden and "the fall" and the characters' relationship with God, but other times, not so much. But the good outweighed the bad, and overall, I enjoyed the book. I found a lot of the sections told by Eve to be really heartbreaking and I identified with many of her struggles with her faith. I can only imagine what it would be like to read it as a mother, and I can see why Kim and Mom may have enjoyed it more, reading it from that point of view.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    This was quite an undertaking for a first time author and she did the story justice. We meet Eve as she is created from Adam, follow her through the expulsion from Eden on through her life on earth. The story is told by Eve herself and her daughters Naava, Aya and Dara. Ms. Elliott fills out the story nicely and even puts in some humour about her relationship with Adam. Well done story.
  • Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
    3/5
    Finished in 3 days-found it thought provoking.
  • Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
    3/5
    Thanks to Goodreads for an advanced copy. While I enjoyed the book I found it to be a bit slow moving. The characters are very likable and it's nice to hear things from Eve's side. Overall an enjoyable read.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    This is an adaption of the story of Genesis; the lives of Adam, Even and their children, namely their three daughters, Dara, Aya and Naava. This is not, however, for the religious-minded. This is not a story of piety or conservatism. Rather, the author looks at the life of Eve and her family as any other people in Mesopotamia six thousand years ago; filled with sex, lies, murder and gods.
  • Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
    3/5
    This book turns the biblical story of Adam and Eve inside out, fitting it neatly into the secular history of ancient Mesopotamia. It chronicles a family, dealing with faith, while facing a monumental cultural clash. Meaningful for out time.
  • Rating: 2 out of 5 stars
    2/5
    This was marketed as Biblical fiction, so when I picked it up I was expecting it to be preachy- in my experience, good Biblical fiction is usually presented as "historical fiction" or something of the sort. It would, however, probably be more accurate to call this "historical fiction" than "Biblical fiction"- it's certainly not going to appeal primarily to the religious.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    Eve is a beautifully written re-imagining of one of mankind's oldest stories. Elliott's writing is exquisitely lyrical, weaving a fascinating story from the multiple points-of-view of Eve and her daughters. I picked up Eve at my library and read it completely for enjoyment, not as someone who has studied the Bible in-depth. Personally, I found it to be an incredibly compelling piece of historical fiction. Elissa Elliott's writing is delicious! Her prose is expressive and graceful - this is a woman who knows how to turn a phrase. When I read a book, I mark memorable and particularly captivating passages so that I can share them with others. By page 60 of Eve, I had marked so many passages that I ran out of post-its! The writing is magnificent, evoking the true spirit of Biblical times for the reader.The characters in Elissa Elliott's Eve - especially Eve's daughters: the eldest, Naava, the beautiful but self-absorbed weaver; Aya, the intelligent, club-footed cook and healer; and Dara, the kind-hearted, perceptive twin - are richly drawn and leap off the pages, brilliantly alive in the reader's mind. The story of Adam and Eve is well-researched and vividly recounted in Elissa Elliott's Eve: A Novel of the First Woman. I would definitely recommend this novel to lovers of historical fiction, and to anyone who enjoys an engaging and delightfully well-written story.
  • Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
    3/5
    I couldn't help beimg reminded of Anita Diamant's The Red Tent while reading Eve: A Novel of the First Woman. It's an inevitable comparison for my brain to make, I guess. Both books are set in Biblical times and retell popular Genesis myths from a decidedly female point-of-view. The main difference being that Eve -- unlike Jacob's daughter, Dinah, the heroine in The Red Tent -- is a prominent figure in Biblical myth, not merely a name mentioned in passing. That is both a blessing and curse, I think. With a name so recognized as that of Eve's, and a myth so widely known as that of Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden, one has less freedom to expand, but also more material to draw inspiration from.One of the things I like most about historical fiction is that it allows an author the unique opportunity to fill in some of the gaps of accepted history (or myth, in this case, which doesn't really make it historical fiction so much as mythological fiction but hey, I'm going with it). For me, this is the area that Elliott fails the most. She attempts to explore so many themes -- the relationship between man and wife, the relationship between mother and child, loss of faith, urban growth vs. rural preservation, jealousy and its repercussions, etc -- that she fails to fully explore any of them and the story as a whole ends up scattered and unfocused with some very large, glaring omissions of much needed information. For a good chunk of the book we're led to believe that Adam and Eve, along with their children, are the only people on earth. Then, BAM!, one day a group of older, more established people show up and build a large, bustling city nearby. Um, where did these people come from, and so many of them, at that? Were they made by other gods? Evolve via natural selection? The spawn of Lilith, perhaps? None of Adam and Eve's children had left home at that point in the story so it's not like any of them went forth and multiplied. How can you present the reader with a group of people so pivotal to the events that take place in the latter half of the book -- a group of people with an entire history and set of customs behind them -- and not give the reader a clear answer as to where those people came from? Did I miss something?And why exactly does Eve lose faith in god? I mean, it's not like she ever really needed faith in god to begin with, right? Believing in the existence of something isn't a matter of faith when that something shows up in the garden he created for you on an almost daily basis just to shoot the shit. I don't need faith to believe that my husband exists, not when he talks to me and makes love to me and snores by me as frequently as he does. He's a very real part of my very real reality and I can't just wake up one day and start doubting that he's really here, as much as I might like to when he leaves coffee rings on the kitchen counter for the too-many-times-I've-lost-count time. I can understand being angry at god for kicking you out of your naked tea party because you had the gall to eat a cookie off of the cookie platter uninvited but to start doubting his actual existence? Color me puzzled. And hungry. I like cookies.But my biggest disappoint is in Elliott's generic, one-dimensional depiction of Cain. I was hoping for a bit more depth to the world's first bad boy. I'll admit, it was a selfish want, as Cain is one of the Biblical figures that interests me the most. (Other favorites being Salome, Judas, and, yes, Satan himself, make of that what you will. Personally, I think it would make for an interesting dinner party. Or naked tea party, perhaps.) I'm not saying he needed to be reframed as some kind of innocent, wide-eyed hero. That's Abel's job and he does it nauseatingly well. But I would have liked to see some believable internal conflict and a realistic treatment of how jealousy and resentment can, in some rare cases, lead to something as extreme as murder. Instead, we get a Cain who's just bad from birth. That's it. He's destined to kill his brother because he killed butterflies as a child and hated to mind his mother. In Elliott's hands, Cain and Abel are little more than the Goofus and Gallant of the Biblical age.I hope I'm not coming off too harsh. As you can see by my rating, three stars = liked it which means I, well, liked it. It was a fine, but flawed, effort, and maybe I'm just picking at its flaws because my hands are blistered from working under the IV hood all day and I can't physically pick at much else right now. So, bad on me, or the hospital for asking me to snap together one-thousand too many Protonix.
  • Rating: 1 out of 5 stars
    1/5
    I found too much dialogue in the book. In the beginning there appeared a large number of characters, all relating their stories, but not establishing a central plot to the book. I found there wasn't anything to excite me initially and eventually stopped reading it.
  • Rating: 1 out of 5 stars
    1/5
    This book was not very good, and I actually could not finish it (which is very rare for me). It tries to be a retelling of genesis from Eve's point of view, a retelling of genesis in a more feminist light, and an alternate history of genesis. It does not come close to succeeding at any of these things. Or at least it hadn't by page 150 when I put it down in repugnance.
  • Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
    3/5
    It's hard to say whether or not I really enjoyed eve. First of all it seemed to read differently, almost like reading eve's journal, which could be interesting in places but often was rather dull. My biggest problem with the book however was that I was expecting to hear an amazing story of eve as more of a heroine, but to me it seemed that she was portrayed as weak. Which is not how I would have envisioned her.
  • Rating: 1 out of 5 stars
    1/5
    I couldn't get past the first chapter.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    Eve A Novel of the First Woman tells the story of Adam, Eve, and their children after they leave the Garden of Eden. The story is told through the memories of Eve and her daughters. Eve recounts the events that led to her and Adam's expulsion from the Garden and also the events leading to the tragedy between Cain and Abel.Each chapter in the book is told by a different character and they are clearly labeled. I did not have difficulty keeping track of who was relating the story. One aspect that was jarring was that most of the chapters are told in first person but Naava's chapters were told in third person. For me, it would have made more sense to write all the chapters in first person or write Eve's in first person and all of the daughters' chapters in third.Eve's chapters meander through her memories, which is a fitting method to tell her tale. She contemplates her life and her relationships with her children, Adam, and Elohim. The reader also learns about Eve through the stories of her daughters and her relationship with her sons.Elliott uses lyrical language to capture Eve's questions and doubts. While Elliott has researched the Biblical story of Adam and Eve, this is a work of fiction and as such, she has taken artistic license with the events to create a compelling tale.Eve A Novel of the First Woman is a beautiful, historical novel that inspires contemplation of ones own life.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    By focusing solely on what others have called "theological inaccuracies," one can easily miss the beauty of the text. At no point does Elliott claim that this is a piece of biblical research - it's fiction! In fact, she discusses her attempt to grapple with the larger, personal questions of faith, family, and femininity, as opposed to focusing on the literal story. As readers, we continuously invest in the "willing suspension of disbelief." Why should that fail us when we look at this particular text? If the book is read in that light and with that mindset, then one can appreciate the textual complexity of it. I quickly embraced the idea of multiple narrators providing multiple viewpoints on single events, as it fleshed out the story, and I didn't mind at all that the male characters were not offered the same opportunity. Hasn't their story been told and retold in the male perspective for centuries?
  • Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
    3/5
    I enjoyed the story here, but had a little trouble keeping track of who was speaking. The author tells her story thru Eve and Eve's three daughters. Eve's part of the story is told in the first person, as are the stories of two of the three daughters, Naava's story (the oldest daughter) is told in the third person. While I can see some of the reasoning for this - with Naava's story in the third person, you don't get quite as attached to her, it does make following the story line a little difficult. Early chapters were also a little difficult to read because Eve was so whiney. This however, changed as the book went along and Eve got older.It was interesting to see the author's take on Adam and Eve, how they felt being cast out of the Garden, how other people came into their lives, what happened with Cain and Abel, and it was really interesting to read the Afterword which told where the author got her ideas. I'm glad this material was included as the Afterword, however, as it does contain some spoilers if you were to read it first.Because this was Eve's story, Adam and the other males (Cain, Abel, and the other sons) in the story got a little bit left out. I would love to see a story written from their viewpoint. It would be interesting to compare the two.
  • Rating: 1 out of 5 stars
    1/5
    This isn't a formal review, but I did want to state a few things about this book. I've been looking forward to this book coming out since Oct/Nov 2008, which was when I first read about. I was extremely excited to have snagged it through the Early Reviewer program and quickly put it to the top of my pile. Unfortunately, having done extensive Bible study, I just couldn't read more than a handful of chapters. The book is told from alternating points of view, which, at least in the beginning of the book, didn't help with the flow. I finally put the book down when Abel tells his younger sister, who is crippled, that "that is the way Elohim wanted you." I understand taking liberties with a story, but if you believe in the Bible and how the Bible presents the story, well then you know that imperfection isn't how God intended us or "wanted" us. HE wanted us to be perfect; it was Adam and Eve who messed that up. In such a few pages, there were just too many liberties being taken with the story of Adam and Eve to make it palattable for me. I'm sure plenty of people will enjoy the story, though.
  • Rating: 2 out of 5 stars
    2/5
    I received this book through the Early Reviewers program. I hoped I would have better luck with it than I did my last ARC, but unfortunately, while "Eve" might be some people's cup of tea, it was not for me."Eve" is retelling of the story of Adam & Eve, tracing their time together in the Garden, their fall, and their life thereafter. It is told through the eyes of Eve, as well as her three daughters, Naava, Aya, and Dara. Eve’s story is told largely in retrospect, while her daughters collectively tell the family’s story beginning at a later date, beginning around the time the family encounters an encroaching civilization, one that is polytheistic at that.I was concerned that "Eve" was going to be poorly written, when on the first page I read a line that sounded as though it were penned by Yoda. I get that sentence structure might have been a bit different in the days of yore, but jumbling word order up (inconsistently as well, since thankfully the whole book isn’t written in this way) isn’t really an effective way to make your language sound appropriately dated. I decided to push forward. Maybe that first part was just a shaky start, but she’d stick the landing? By and large the prose was serviceable, but there were parts that were awkward and even bits that were downright embarrassing. There wasn’t an abundance of sex in what I read (just two short snippets), but at one point Elliott does write that as Adam positions his penis before her it “had grown, like a roll of warm bread”.Awkward writing aside, I just didn’t think this book was very good. Obviously the author is taking liberties with the story of Adam & Eve, which is totally fine with me since I’m not religious, and I tend to enjoy biblical retellings, provided they are done well. This, however, read like a sudsy soap opera dressed up as historical fiction. It’s pretty trashy and feels inconsequential, and while I respect the authors stance on questioning faith and belief, this just doesn’t have much heft to it. Ultimately, I couldn’t finish this book (though I made it about halfway, which I think is enough to give a fair review of the novel's style, prose, and tone). I think that "Eve" amounts to little more than a guilty pleasure read, so when I didn’t find it pleasurable, what was the point in sticking with it? The dialogue didn’t ring true to me, since it really felt as though modern-day people had just been transported to Mesopotamia. I found the book never felt authentic, and every plot point felt gimmicky and like a telenovella twist. Six-year olds speaking like adults? Eve giving birth to a premature still-born while walking through the woods with Adam after having just survived a bear attack? Five-year olds cooking meals with the aplomb of a Top Chef and commandeering home births? Poisoning your mother with hemlock? Do you see what I’m getting at? Some people might find this stuff riveting, but it’s pap and literary dross, and I was bored by it. I could see reading this mindlessly on a beach, but you know what? It’s January, and it’s 2°F outside, and I don’t even know of a swimming pool I could go to.I do think this book will be enjoyed by certain readers, but I am clearly not its target audience. The writing made my cheeks flame with second-degree embarrassment at times, and the plot was outlandish. I could forgive neither, and got little enjoyment from either to boot, so I decided to stop at the halfway point rather than chugging through the 400+ pages. If you think this book will be moving and reminiscent of Anita Diamant’s The Red Tent, run, don’t walk, away from this book.