The Woman from Lydia
The Emissaries #1
by Angela Hunt

My rating: 5 / 5
Genre: Biblical fiction

When Euodia, a Christ-follower in AD 51, sees a young slave girl being treated terribly by her master, she buys the slave to free her. But though the slave no longer brought a profit for her masters after a Jewish rabbi had robbed her of her “gift” of divination, one of her masters claims the sale was not done legally. He takes the girl back and travels to find someone who can restore her gift so she can continue to earn money for him. Euodia and her servants follow the master and slave in the hopes of rescuing the girl who should rightfully be free.

Hunt takes a couple of passages from the book of Acts and weaves them into a rich, heart-filled story that I absolutely loved! The bulk of the story is the journey east from Philippi, Euodia trailing behind Hector Hostilius, hoping to catch up to him before he manages to restore the slave girl’s gift with an unclean spirit or sells her for being worthless to him. Even before that, though, and throughout, I was caught up in the setting, from the work Euodia does making purple clothing to the travel on the Via Egnatia and so many other things. A warning for those who might be bothered by this kind of thing—Hunt doesn’t shy away from the harsh realities of life during this time period—violence, idol worship, sexual immorality, etc.

Euodia’s faith in Christ came from an encounter with the apostle Paul, who is also the rabbi that “cursed” the slave girl Sabina by casting a demon out of her (these are both of the parts that came from Acts). While most of us don’t face the kind of situation Euodia is in here, trying to literally free a girl in captivity, I mentally cheered her resolve and wholehearted trust in God. I was on the edge of my seat waiting to see how it was all going to play out. The book goes back and forth between Euodia and Hector for much of the book, and I’ll admit that that led me to expect a far different outcome to the book than it has. An unpredictable plot is a good thing, though, and there was not one thing about the plot or the ending that I would have changed. Well, maybe one thing, but it’s small and would be a spoiler to explain. And I did notice a few weird name discrepancies, wherein a slave was first given one name then later referred to by another and Hector’s business partner had 2 slightly different spellings for his last name. If either of these things was intentional, I didn’t pick up on it.

There is some romance in the story, but it also was not what I expected from early in the book, and it was my favorite kind—subtle and sweet. I appreciate that Hunt didn’t give us more than necessary in the way of physical interaction between the two involved, which I feel happens far too often in Christian fiction. Overall, I earnestly recommend this book for those who enjoy biblical fiction, especially from the time after Christ.

Thank you to Netgalley and Bethany House for providing me a copy of this book to review.

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