Sarai

Following the successful Wives of King David series, Smith opens her new Wives of the Patriarchs series with this midrashic expansion of the story of Abraham and his wife, Sarah. In the biblical account, Sarah gives birth in her old age to Isaac, as God has promised her husband, Abraham, whose descendants will be as numerous as stars. In this account, the beautiful Sarai, as she is first called, deeply loves her husband and follows him when his Lord calls, even as she waits for decades for the promised child and endures a dangerous passage to Egypt that produces a threat to her marriage in the form of her maid Hagar. Smith is at her best in handling the triangulated relationship between Abraham, Sarah, and Hagar; the subplot involving Abraham’s nephew Lot and his family is less emotionally compelling. The pace occasionally drags, but most of the book is about faithful waiting. Smith breathes new imaginative life into a well-known sacred story. Agent: Wendy Lawton. (Mar.)