Stone Tables

Imagine living Moses' life from the inside: raised in the Egyptian court, then choosing to abandon that privilege for a harder path. Born under a decree that condemned infant boys to death, he survived, was adopted by Pharaoh's daughter, and was given the status of a royal son. Yet he identified himself with the Israelites. Later, after hoping for a modest life as a shepherd, he was called by the Lord to confront Pharaoh and demand the release of God's people. Along the way he moved from the splendor of palaces to the emptiness of the desert, and from being regarded as a divine figure to learning who the true God is.

The novel asks how a man in Moses' position could have made the decisions that shaped him into a prophet, and what those years looked like from his own vantage point. Latter-day Saint author Orson Scott Card offers an imagined answer to these questions, recognizing that no one can truly know Moses' inner experience.

Card also gives voice to the people who traveled with Moses: his brother Aaron, his sister Miriam, the two women he called mother, and his wife. Each lived through the move from the despair of slavery to the freedom of the Exodus, and from relying on their own cleverness and strength to placing their trust in God. Through their perspectives, the reader gets to know Moses as those closest to him did.