Imagining the lives of real people from history will always be a fascinating pasttime. Hence the popularity of historical fiction. There were very few biographies before print was invented and even then they are limited to factual accounting. We can only guess how they were feeling and what went through their minds.
The Bible, in particular, is scant on detail. Though as it spans thousands of years of history and includes hundreds of characters, it is necessarily so. Elizabeth or Elisheva, John the Baptist's mother, gets a very brief mention in the Bible. Though thinking about it and what it must have been like for her as a woman, unable to do the one thing women were prized for at the time, then to get pregnant at an age that even now would be unusual and finally, to know that your beloved and long-awaited son would live a spectacular but short life. Her life must have been very eventful and emotional.
One Illumined Thread was inspired by a real painting the author saw, "Visitation", by Mariotto Albertinelli, 1503, which depicts the meeting between Elizabeth and Mary.
The theme of childlessness is repeated in all three women's stories - Elisheva in 1st century BC, Antonia in the 16th century and Dr Reed in the 21st century. Though each woman is childless for different, equally heartbreaking reasons. Each women goes through the trauma of losing or knowing she will lose the child she fought so hard to have. They each also have to forge their paths despite the men and the male-driven society in their lives.
This was a delight to read and I blazed through it, connecting with each woman for different reasons. The facts in Elisheva (Elizabeth)'s story followed the Bible somewhat loosely. The supernatural part was significant enough that I wondered why the author would choose to omit some parts of it, such as Mary's divine conception, or Elisheva's vision when she met Mary. It makes me lose confidence in the author's historical accuracy. Although this is a work of fiction, it is based on historical fact and it doesn't do well to change things because it may turn some readers off.
The part that rang loudest for me was when Herod sent his troops to kill all the baby boys under the age of one. In the Bible it is stated very factually. Yet it had to be such a terrifying and emotionally charged event.
Each woman also has a strained relationship with their mother for different reasons. So in effect, we have six mothers in this book. However, I'm not sure how I feel about how mother-daughter relationships seem to be portrayed as so much more fraught than mother-son relationships.
Dr Reed's story is the briefest because this book is more about the women in history and how their stories are not so different from a woman from our own time.
It is not tied up neatly at the end, which I usually do not enjoy. However, you know how Elizabeth's story ends with tragedy and I felt it was appropriate that Antonia and Dr Reed's stories are left somewhat open-ended with only a hint of what's to come. So for me, there was much satisfaction to be had and I closed the book with a smile on my face.