THE FIRE IN THE ROCK

Tzipporah, the widow of Moses, lives at the foot of Mount Nevo -- aged, blind and alone. The pilgrims no longer come to hear her stories of how she and her husband led the people out of Egypt; the wonder tales of the storytellers have grown more grand and glorious than the truth. She is tormented by her memories of the momentous things that she has seen and heard -- and of other, secret things that she has never told anyone.  
Then a stranger comes, seeking the truth. He convinces Tzipporah to tell her story at last, to reveal what really happened in Egypt, in the desert, and at the Mountain of God.

She tells of her childhood in the land of Midyan, as the eldest daughter of the renegade priest Yisro. She tells of her husband Kisil — a troubled man, a rootless wanderer, who becomes the love of her life. Together, the two are swept up in a series of extraordinary events; Kisil seizes the moment to free his people, then finds himself compelled to become Moses, the Lawgiver —and Tzipporah reveals her own hidden role in this world-changing story. 
THE FIRE IN THE ROCK is not a conventional Bible story. It will challenge believers and doubters alike; its message is at once deeply humanistic and deeply reverent, taking both rational thought and the religious impulse seriously while denigrating neither. It tells the story of the Exodus as it might really have happened — and of the ordinary man and woman who were swept up in those extraordinary events. Most of all, it tells of their love; the passion and devotion that sustained them as they defied a king, freed a people, and changed the world.

"The Fire in the Rock: A Novel of the Exodus" is published by Charles H. Norman, and hosted on NetGalley through a cooperative agreement with Fawkes Press, LLC