THE ROMANCE READER by Pearl Abraham...

THE ROMANCE READER by Pearl Abraham (Riverhead Books: $12, 296 pp.). Abraham’s vivid first novel focuses on Rachel Benjamin, the eldest daughter of a Hasidic rabbi, who feels suffocated by the community’s rigid amalgam of biblical strictures and Eastern European traditions. Every detail of life is regulated, and prying eyes watch for the smallest slip.

Rachel agrees to an arranged marriage, hoping to obtain relative freedom, only to discover her new husband is completely under her father’s thumb. Wearily, she concludes, “I don’t want to fight for anything. I want to just be and do, with no one saying they’re letting me.”