Here are the brief biographies of 52 women who have one thing in common ey did not allow fear or social pressure to stop them from achieving their individual accomplishments. Three thematic sections are devoted to daredevils, adventurers, and rebels. Their feats of daring include wing-walking, spying, skydiving, exploring, doctoring, and entertaining, and most came at a time when women were not encouraged to be trailblazers. However, their stories are not limited to sideshows. Humanitarian stories abound, such as Irena Sendler, who saved thousands of children during the Holocaust, and Lyda Conley, a Native American activist. These women, mostly American and European, are not always household names, but their influence is still being felt today. Every one-page biography is accompanied by a stellar illustration that captures the spirit and attitude of each woman and provides visual reference to their times and their professions. Whether read as a cohesive body of stories or as individual brief biographies, this book is a worthwhile study in tenacity.

A populous gallery of courageous, independent women from (fairly) recent times.Skeers' roster of acrobats, aviators, professional wrestlers, mountaineers, rescuers, survivors, medical workers, and intrepid travelers has a mildly antique flavor, being drawn largely from the 19th and 20th centuries (a few of the subjects are still alive, mostly in retirement). On the other hand, nearly all of her choices are likely to be unfamiliar to young readers. Arranged beneath the subtitle's three headers (and alphabetized by first name rather than last), each gets a rubric ("Arctic Survivor," "Bodacious Bicyclist," "Lionhearted Librarian"), a stylized full-length portrait from Gosling with an iconographic border, and a one-page highlight-reel tribute that generally ends on an inspirational note: Sophie Blanchard, "dainty and daring" balloonist, "bested the danger and defied social norms, stereotypes, and even gravity itself to prove that women could successfully achieve their high-flying dreams." The author doesn't cast her net too widely, as all but 12 of these putative role models hail from the United States or Europe, and though nonwhite minorities are decently, if not strongly, represented, she is inconsistent about noting them. Also, the large bibliography is not at all user-friendly, being arranged by author rather than subject and presented in an indigestible mass of miniscule type. Unvarnished but nevertheless valuable for fishing so many admirably nonconformist women from obscurity. (index) (Collective biography. 10-14)