A review by viveknshah
Good Night Stories for Rebel Girls, Volume 1: 100 Tales of Extraordinary Women by Francesca Cavallo, Elena Favilli
3.0
Reason why this is the most crowdsourced funded project- there is a demand and this delivers. The lack of children's books where women are driving their own destiny led to this book sharing true stories. Whilst it is a children's illustrated book sharing 100 women role models over a diverse set of occupations - explorer, pirate, computer science engineer, politician, chef making sure you have a field in mind and there is a role model to look upto. The book was an eye opener for me too reading about names I hadn't heard before and their impact in their domains. like I had no clue the famous Egyptian Hatshepsut was a woman. Indians who make it in this volume are Rani Laxmibai and Mary Kom. Sure many more volumes will showcase more great personalities (Sri Lankan Sirimavo Bandarnaike was an omission I was surprised about.) Not just girls, this is a good book for all kids to be aware of some of the brilliant humans (gender agnostic) who have made a difference to the world.
The challenge with one page bios of such personalities is that you can never get the complete picture in that and hence it becomes more important to make sure you capture the essence. THe greatest architect is famous for throwing tantrums at the airport! not the wonderful impact she created in architecture. Some bios feel super lazy where a wiki entry probably adds more character and you aren't moved/inspired by the individual. The illustrations are well done and surely will keep the interest of the kids as they march on through the book.
The challenge with one page bios of such personalities is that you can never get the complete picture in that and hence it becomes more important to make sure you capture the essence. THe greatest architect is famous for throwing tantrums at the airport! not the wonderful impact she created in architecture. Some bios feel super lazy where a wiki entry probably adds more character and you aren't moved/inspired by the individual. The illustrations are well done and surely will keep the interest of the kids as they march on through the book.