This was a good read! The book might be a bit modern for some that were expecting a more accurate version of Lilith. I thought the book was funny at times, emotional, and drama filled.

Thank you NetGalley for the ebook ARC!

Lilith was such a fascinating read. This book brought to me a new perspective on retailing's and I thoroughly enjoyed it. I can't say i absolutely adored the writing or where the story led me. But it was different and interesting and sometimes a change of pace is nice.

The narrative style of this book really bothered me. I felt like there was a lack of depth, which made both the setting and the character development lackluster. I also thought that the dialogue was too modern. I was expecting something similar to Madeline Miller or Natalie Haynes.

That is to NetGalley for the opportunity to read this book. This is a heard one for me to rate. My feelings about it are truly all over the place. It tells the story of Lilith, the first woman according to Judaism and a figure that has been claimed by many modern witches, from her point of view. I feel like I may have gotten more out of parts of this had I known more about Jewish mythology. What I do know is that this story takes a feminist look at the mythology of Lilith all those she interacted with over the course of (I’m assuming ) the first testament. And then up to modern day. Parts of this book were beautifully written and insightful. Parts were downright boring. Overall the book left me feeling kind of “meh”.

Marmery really did her homework for this retelling. There's nothing like having your own foundational myth flipped. I didn't love "Lilith" quite as much as Marmery's prior novel "On Wilder Seas" because it was not as plot-driven and much more philosophical (and sometimes repetitively so as Lilith encounters different women) but it really, truly, made me ponder how much differently the Jewish and Christian religions could have unfolded if not so repressively and cruelly patriarchal, conveniently embracing some ancient texts and suppressing others.

If Lilith was kicked out of the Garden of Eden before the curse, she could indeed be both wise and immortal! I never thought about the implications of this before. In this feminist spin, she carries the truth of the Divine Feminine through the centuries, encountering familiar figures from the Torah and the Bible, hoping to find women who will listen to her Truth and carry it forward. The women she finds who are bold enough to call for the worship of the Queen of Heaven are invariably stamped out and demonized as wicked whores, along with the message, in favor of a single-male-god religion, and their places of worship burned and razed to the ground. Right up to the present day, Lilith is still present in the world and still hopes women will listen.

I feel very conflicted on the character of Lilith with in novel; as a person with jewish heritage Lilith is a character used to speak on the greed and darker aspects of humanity. However I have found that Marmery is not of Jewish decent or faith which makes me lean towards this portal of Lilith is based on Christianity; so on that aspect of her character I cannot speak. The story its self was a read that is very similar to that of Madeline Miller's Circe; Lilith does understand the themes and ideas that the story is trying to covey it lacks the heart that Millers work has knowing that we are supposed to understand Circe and what lead her to her darker actions. Lilith rather gabbles with the idea that the reader is ready for a villain arc rather than a retelling.

With a title like just plain "Lilith," and my immediate assumption being okay, please tell me this is apocryphal/kind of biblical/demon/vampire/oh-my-god-we-all-love Lilith. And I was glad to find out that it is! We've seen a lot of recent interpretations, all of them different, in recent media that depict Lilith whether it was "Supernatural" making her at first a creepy demon child and then a woman who tricked Sam and Dean and hell on earth, etc, or it was the Sabrina Netflix reveal which personally I... yeah -- that was a different interpretation and let's leave it at that. There was also the "True Blood" horrendous Lilith and Bill and Lilith thing and I just ... okay, that just another interpretation. I haven't been able to find an interpretation in visual media of Lilith that I like. The closest I have ever gotten is the Lucifer comics that were a springboard-off from Neil Gaiman's Sandman for the Lucifer who appears in that Sandman universe, and Mazikeen. Oh, how I love Mazikeen.

Anyway, back to Lilith and this book. The book wastes no time making Adam of the Bible seeming like a complete douche, pretty much. Then when Lilith doesn't "play her part" the wrathful angels come after her. They're frightening. And then there's Eve--in this version, Lilith tried to warn Eve, but Eve wasn't having any of it, and so God re-made Lilith into a demon. She also talks about being blessed by another deity (I think?) Asherah and because of that, Lilith has wings.

The book is told in the style of a sort of "Circe" kind of vibe where it's like an epic poem or like Homer's Odyssey but it's kind of shaped more to appeal to modern readers. It reads very much in the same vein as a Dante's Inferno, and seems to stick to a chronological imagining of "this is how things went down," which is fine for the readers who enjoy it! I was expecting more like... okay, are we going to diverge from the Lilith narrative? Are you going to show us how she's doing something other than what we already know she did -- ish?

She gets involved with, as you might imagine, Sammael, AKA one of the names of Lucifer. She also gets involved with Ereshkigal, who comes to us from Mesopotamian mythology as a dark goddess of the Underworld.

And then we get into Noah's Flood .. She starts to find out as time passes and she goes to all these different places, how her legend grew, and how people turned her into this jezebel who drinks the blood of infants.

I've decided to give the book.a 4 overall because the writing is of a good quality.

I've always been interested in the mythos of Lilith, Adam's purported & greatly vilified "first wife", so I requested this novel quite eagerly. While I enjoyed the concept, I did have a few issues with this book, particularly the whole section with Jezebel, which was just too over-the-top. However, the Garden of Eden & the Ark sections were exactly what I wanted from this one. I'm glad I read it & would recommend to those who think they'd be interested in this mythology. My thanks to the publisher & Net Galley for the complimentary DRG, and I am leaving this review voluntarily.

This book was a different take on the story of Lilith and parts of the bible. Told from a view where importance of women is continually misunderstood and ignored which I absolutely loved.
While I did find parts of this book slow it didn't dampen my experience
Thank you to net galley for the chance to read and review

3.5 stars

This is going to be a must read for anyone who identifies as a woman. As Marmery says at the onset of the book, “For women everywhere. Be your own gods. Your Mother commands it.”

This book is from the POV of Lilith, the actual first woman who was cast out of the garden after gaining knowledge, being raped by Adam, and refusing to put up with being unequal to a man. In this very interesting retelling of Hebrew myth and the Bible, we follow Lilith over the span of millennia as she tries to battle the erosion of women’s equality and other religions in which goddesses (just new names for the Mother) are worshiped. It spans from Adam and Eve, to Noah’s Ark, to Lilith spending time with Jezebel, to Lilith preaching against male superiority and one God with Maryam (Mary Magdalene), to present day.

My thoughts: At times it felt too fast, but this was inevitable with the breadth of the book. At times it also felt slow, but this also closely mirrored how Lilith felt slogging through centuries waiting for her chance to spread knowledge. I adored Lilith’s narrative style and humor. I LOVED Samael and quite a few other minor characters. In the periods in which Lilith hunkered down for extended stays, I really enjoyed the Noah’s Ark and Maryam parts. Jezebel seemed to me just to be a cruel badass.

Overall, I highly recommend this book. As I said, any woman, and especially any feminist needs to read this book. It will make you feel validated and empowered.

Thank you to Net Galley and Alcove Press for this ARC in exchange for an honest review!

3/5 stars! The cover of this book is stunning and I was excited to read a mythology re-telling. I understand there were religious elements to the story the author was pulling from, but it did still feel too religious to me. It felt like the story was slotting itself firmly from the Christian perspective. I did really appreciate the feminist narrative of the story. Overall, an average read with some exciting plot points, but not as complex as I'd like.

I received an advance review copy for free through NetGalley, and I am leaving this review voluntarily

For a bulk of this book I was a little confused where we were going plot-wise, but so appreciated the author notes at the end that showed off how many ideas, cultures, and myths she combined to create this new narrative.

I was provided an ARC of this book. I knew a bit about Lilith from reading Rashi’s Daughters - that she was feared after the birth of a baby, that she could “take their life”. This is an interesting perspective on her. A bit long, but we’ll written, good character development and you felt like you were in the scenery- it was described so beautifully. Worth reading if you are interested in creation.

Lilith, the first wife of Adam, brings about the biggest change known to humankind— wisdom— after she eats from the tree of knowledge. From there she is banished from Eden. She spends the rest of her life searching for the Mother (Asherah) who has been relegated to history’s hidden past.

While there were some slow parts, I truly enjoyed this historical fiction account of the first woman. Not only do we hear Lilith’s story, but also the account of Samael, Eve, Norea (wife of Noah), Jezebel, Maryam (of Magdala), and more.

Ultimately this isn’t just the story of Lilith. It’s the story of women throughout biblical times who have been labeled as demonic, whores, or purposefully unnamed and left out completely. It’s the story of finding a woman’s place in history and continuously fighting to be known as the equals, not “made of”, of men.

Thank you so much to Alcove Press and NetGalley for the ARC!

3.5/5 stars
I have read a lot of "feminist" retellings of myths and legends recently that fall short of actually being feminist (author gives the character a sword, she kills people and that's it, for example), but I found myself pleasantly surprised overall by this book's approach to a classically demonized figure of Hebrew myth. Lilith is many things: outspoken, brave, loving, tender, etc. She is a whole person despite being humanity's first woman and being held on that pedestal. I also enjoyed that there is some care and research injected into this story, and I appreciated reading the historical notes at the end. I liked that Lilith's story, and some biblical stories, were reframed and examined more deeply.

I did have some issues with this novel that at times detracted from my enjoyment, however. I found the language to be uneven at times (your typical modern dialogue inserted into prose that you would find in the Bible or an older text). Additionally, I was not particularly moved by Lilith as a character. Even though she inserts herself into these women's lives and has very human experiences of her own, I did not feel any real connection to her. I found that she seems to largely be observing and not really doing in parts of the novel that I feel could have benefited from her interference. The pacing also felt a little odd; some parts of the novel could have been a tiny bit longer for better impact. Finally, I didn't really enjoy endless paragraphs of Lilith asking a million philosophical questions and reiterating the main themes of the novel; this felt a little heavy-handed and plodding.

It is a good interpretation of Lilith as a sacred being and as a human searching for women's salvation, but with some undoubted execution issues.

Mythology retellings are always hit or miss for me, but Lilith is definitely a hit. Telling the story of the first Woman, Mikki Marmery does an excellent job of showing us Lilith's rage and determination. A great tale for feminists everywhere.

I enjoyed this story and appreciate hearing the retelling of the story from Lilith's perspective, but the execution needs some revision I think. The language is kind of... odd? It goes from very modern to very oldschool in a way that feels disjointed. The concept is great, but there is some wording and pacing issues that should be edited, in my opinion.

Thank you to NetGalley for this arc in exchange for an honest review!

Lilith is one of my favorite characters in mythology/theology, and I think this book created a really good and well-rounded story and character for her. I really enjoyed it and I plan to get a physical copy of it when it is released

First of all, thank you to Negalley, the publisher and the author for an ARC of Lilith, in exchange for an honest.

I absolutely loved this take on the story of Lilith and many other women from the Bible. As a pagan and as a feminist, it truly spoke to me.

We follow Lilith through her expulsion from Eden, meeting Samael, traveling to the underworld, riding in Noah's arc, encountering Jezebel and Mary Magdalene, trying to save humanity and given women their rightful place as an equal to men. Marmery's descriptions of the places Lilith goes, the people she meets and, oh my goodness, the things she eats, just pull you in as if you're right there with her. I enjoyed the modern language Lilith uses since we find out that she is the author of the story herself, now in modern times, having lived thousands of years as the world developed. As I got near the end, I thought it was going to have a very disappointing ending because, well, look at the state of the world right now. However Marmery expertly diverted us from that cliff the story was rushing towards and I was happy with how the story concludes.

I'm going to absolutely recommend this book to every witch, pagan and woman I know.

The story is very interesting and it is written in a biblical way, kinda. But I found this style a little difficult on the long run and wasn't able to truly get in despite really wanted to know what happened.