Counted with the Stars

Counted with the Stars (Book 1: Out of Egypt series) by Connilyn Cossette      352 pages

The sub-genre of Biblical fiction is, surprisingly, new to me. I have never encountered it prior to reading Connilyn Cossette’s Counted with the Stars. I enjoy Christian fiction and cannot get enough historical fiction so I eagerly delved into this novel.

This is the story of the Exodus of the Hebrews from Egypt. I didn’t understand the terminology of the timeframes (i.e.: 1^st Day of Akhet, Season of inundation), but that didn’t interfere with the story at all. The timeline for the novel is basically 1447-8 BC. That was enough for me to place the story.

A thirteen-year-old Egyptian girl, Kiya, is sold into slavery to settle the debts her father incurred from his failed business. She is sold to his friend, Shefu, as a handmaiden for his wife, Tekurah. Tekurah lives to humiliate her slaves, and the fact that Kiya is a favorite of her husband’s infuriates her. She treats Kiya worse, if that is possible, than the Hebrew slaves.

Kiya befriends another slave, Shira, and the girls become best friends. Together they endure their indentured life. As Kiya does her best to satisfy her mistress, the ten plagues are visited upon Egypt. Author Cossette does an amazing job in making reader’s skin crawl with the lizards, lice, frogs, grasshoppers, etc. that invade the desert country. They came a little too close together in my mind. It was like one day for each of the plagues.

As the Hebrews are forced to flee Egypt to escape the deaths of first-born sons, Kiya decides to follow them. As the review from Publisher’s Weekly stated, “Readers will smell the fear on Passover night, feel the wonder of the Red Sea crossing, and sympathize with the starving and thirsting of those escaping in the wilderness.”

Attention of detail and well-developed characters make this a stand-out novel. As I read in “A Note From the Author,” I learned that names in Ancient Egyptian culture are extremely important. I wish Cossette had given us more information about that, but since I didn’t know that while I was reading, that is really an afterthought.

One of thhe things that I liked was the blue Cloud that seemed to follow  Moses. It was like a biblical version of the Northen Lights.

There is one area where the names were an issue, especially in the beginning. Many of the characters names began with “s,” which was confusing. Sometimes I had to flip back to remember who was who, especially in regards to the secondary characters. It is for this reason, I give Counted with the Stars (Book 1: Out of Egypt series) 4 out 5 stars.