This slim book presents the stories of a carefully selected group of female figures in the Hebrew Bible, Apocrypha, and New Testament. In Connor's judgment, these figures represent the experiences of women in a variety of situations. Noting the paucity of attention given to biblical women in church settings, she hopes that their stories can be inspirational for all people today, especially in contemplating the plight of the powerless, by enabling people to recognize their similarity to women who are “so far from us in years and so close to us in their desires and abilities” (6). But Fierce is not a simple retelling of the biblical stories; rather it is midrashic. Midrash imaginatively updates and augments the ancient sacred source in contemporary terms in order to find new or relevant meaning; it is especially effective when the “original” text is abhorrent, for it serves to justify its place in Scripture.

The book has three parts. The first—“The Only Four (plus Mary)”—presents the women (Tamar, Rahab, Bathsheba, and Ruth) in the genealogy of Jesus in Matthew 1. The problematic and painful sexual pasts of the four Old Testament figures foreshadow Mary's struggles in her role as mother of Jesus and as a prophet. Part 2, “Hebrew Women,” provides vignettes of Eve, Hagar (and Sarah), Deborah, and Jael, the woman in the Song of Songs, several widows, Jerusalem as a metaphoric woman, and Susanna, as well as the Canaanite/Israelite deity Asherah. Different aspects of female suffering, leading, serving, and caring are portrayed in these dramatically varied figures—from deity and national leader to slave and disenfranchised widows. Part 3, “Christian Women,” elaborates on the stories of the Samaritan and Canaanite women, Martha and Mary of Bethany, the two Herodiases, four of Paul's colleagues (Priscilla, Phoebe, Lydia, and Rhoda), and Mary of Magdala. Deeply meaningful spiritual lessons can be found in the roles and struggles of these New Testament figures. The book is supplemented with two appendices: one provides biblical citations for the book's stories; the other is an all-too-short, and thus inadequate, list of suggestions for further reading.

Although the book is neither academic nor scholarly, it does draw on some feminist biblical scholarship. Among the best examples are Connor's treatment of Eve, which eschews the common association of the first woman with sin and evil and recognizes her disobedience as a descriptive rather than prescriptive characteristic, and of Mary of Magdala, which rescues Jesus’ prominent disciple and spokesperson from the common misrepresentation of her as a whore. At the same time, Fierce perpetuates misconceptions that scholarship has corrected. Wives and daughters, for example, were not the “property” of their husbands or fathers as asserted in the chapters on Tamar (12–13), Hagar (74), and widows (100); marital bonding usually involved complex legal and economic factors for both parties. Nor is there any reason (except perhaps repeating biblical biases unsubstantiated by extrabiblical information) to call Canaanites “filthy and sexually threatening” (11). Perhaps most egregious is the supposition that women (like Tamar [13] and Naomi [33]) were valued only for childbearing; archaeological and anthropological analyses of Israelite materials have revealed women's essential economic, religious, social, and political roles. Another problem is that Connor's labeling of figures is misleading, flattening their ethnic or religious diversity. None of the women in part 2 (“Hebrew Women”) are Hebrew (except Sarah); rather they are Israelite, Egyptian, Kenite, Jewish, and Canaanite (a deity). And not all the women in part 3 (“Christian Women”) are Christian; some (including Mary, Martha, Mary of Magdala, and possibly the Herodiases) are Jews, others Samaritan and Canaanite.

These issues notwithstanding, the book is an engaging and worthwhile read. The midrashic retellings are poignantly and sometimes comically autobiographical. Through the lens of her own experiences as a daughter, sister, wife, mother, student, chaplain, and friend, Connor breathes life into the distant figures, so that their stories bear witness to and provide hope for the struggles of twenty-first-century life.