The Levite's Concubine

Viye Raines' novel The Levite's Concubine is an engrossing retelling of the most bizarre and savage chapter in the Hebrew Bible — Judges Chapter 19.Told with striking historical detail, one of the most ancient parts of the Old Testament comes alive, opening with the concubine fleeing her master and closing with the her startling and unforgettable destruction.Affecting and intimate, unrestrained and ghastly, The Levite's Concubine combines rich storytelling with an original insight into Biblical history and women's roles in a compelling time and place — about 1000 years BCE — in the land that would become Israel.Although the story told in Judges Chapter 19 is violent, it ultimately takes our attention because of its treatment of women. Not only does it feature as its central act a vicious molestation of an innocent woman, it is also a part of a religious text. This text, our Hebrew Bible, is not just central to Jewish and Christian civilisation, but also to their worship, and is held by nearly a third of the people of the planet to be spiritually significant.