What is Maggie Anton reading?

The current featured contributor to Writers Read: Maggie Anton, author of the Rashi's Daughters trilogy -- Book I: Joheved, Book II: Miriam, and Book III: Rachel -- and the YA novel, Rashi's Daughter, Secret Scholar.

Her entry begins:

I'm currently reading Julian by Gore Vidal, who is probably one of this country's best writers of historical fiction. I'm actually reading it as research for my next book, which takes place in Babylonia at about the time. But I can hardly put Julian down and I feel guilty for enjoying this book so much when I'm reading it for work. I envy Gore Vidal's ability to bring his character's personality to life so vividly and to perfectly capture the deadly political intrigues of 4th-century Rome. I know it was...[read on]

Among the praise for Book III: Rachel:

"Rashi’s Daughters: Rachel is an enlightened, empowering, and engaging journey of Rashi’s youngest daughter Rachel, who enacts the forbidden during the Middle Ages—studying and teaching Talmud as a female. Thought-provoking, research-rich, psychologically complex, Rachel is a mirror of our own hearts and minds, a tale of pathos that awakens the tenderest of emotions, even if time separates us by nine hundred years."
--Elissa Elliott, author of Eve: A Novel of the First Woman

"Imaginative and talented novelists have the ability to shed fresh light on corners of history otherwise inaccessible. Maggie Anton’s new book, Rashi’s Daughters: Rachel, takes us once again into the Medieval Jewish world of love and learning and the love of learning. One can only be grateful for such an intriguing and engaging work."
--Tamara Cohn Eskenazi, Professor of Bible, Hebrew Union College – Jewish Institute of Religion; editor of The Torah: A Women’s Commentary (Winner of National Jewish Book Award).

Visit Maggie Anton's website and blog.

Writers Read: Maggie Anton.

--Marshal Zeringue