Leading Ladies

Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison, (R)-Texas, examines the lives of American trailblazers, such as First Ladies Jacqueline Kennedy and Lady Bird Johnson; military leaders Sarah Emma Edmonds, Anna May Hayes, and Virginia Hall; writers and activists Pearl Buck, Toni Morrison, Jane Addams, and Elizabeth Cady Stanton; and women of science and medicine, such as Alice Hamilton. This list is far from complete as other remarkable women are also featured. As narrator, Hutchison employs a flat, inexpressive narrative quality that lacks energy. The presentation does not match the history-making drama found in these women's accomplishments. This is a shame as these stories deserve a first-rate audio presentation. Additionally, the lack of liner notes listing the women included in the program is frustrating. M.R.E. (c) AudioFile 2008, Portland, Maine

October 1, 2007
Texas senator Hutchison follows American Heroines with an inspiring volume that highlights women who helped to pave the way for subsequent generations. It includes obligatory profiles of suffragists and First Ladies, but the book's merit is in the sketches of women who have made significant contributions to the arts and sciences, as well as those who made inroads in areas historically dominated by men-battlefields and boardrooms among them. A chapter on women in the military looks at women who have fought in wars dating back to the revolution, while a wide array of women's contributions to public health get a nod in another chapter. Profiles of novelists such as Harriet Beecher Stowe, Pearl S. Buck, Toni Morrison and Amy Tan are fascinating, though readers may find themselves flipping past the sections dedicated to women who have won household name status (Susan B. Anthony, Hillary Clinton, Eleanor Roosevelt, Jacqueline Kennedy and the like). There's enough here to pique almost any reader interested in women's history.