Biography Girls

For more than 50 years, Wendy McCarthy has been on the leading edge of Australian feminism, and her trailblazing advocacy and leadership have made her a widely respected and revered figure: a woman who shaped her times as much as she was shaped by them. Now, at 80 years of age, she shares her remarkable life and achievements. From sheltered country schoolgirl to relentless campaigner for abortion and contraception, from passionate teacher to lifelong advocate for education, Wendy smashed the glass ceiling again and again.

Four shocking crimes. Four lives lost. Countless lives shattered. Four shocking tales of young lives cut brutally short that will make you want to hug your daughter and never let her go.

While their husbands, brothers and sweethearts fought in Europe and their mothers, sisters and friends kept the home fires burning, for the first time, a group of remarkable women took to the skies. They weren't allowed into combat but risked their lives in bad weather and without radios to bring our boys the aircraft they so vitally needed. Employed by the Air Transport Auxiliary, these women were known as 'attagirls'. They proved that women, too, could master Spitfires, Mosquitoes and Hawker Hurricanes, forging a new path in aviation.

"I dragged my heels all the way to the mill. ‘I can’t do it!’ I sulked. Mother sighed and shook her head. My heart sank. Of course, I’d seen the mill hundreds of times before, but now it was different - now, I was going in. I’d never seen a place so depressing; I wanted to cry." With tales from hardworking Audrey and mischievous Maureen to high-spirited Doris and dedicated Marjorie, The Mill Girls is an evocative story of hardship and friendship from when cotton was still king.

An activist calls for better support of young families so they can thrive and reflects on her experiences as a Black mother and college student fighting for opportunities for herself and her child. Pregnant Girl presents the possibility of a different future for young mothers - one of success and stability - in the midst of the dismal statistics that dominate the national conversation.

The chilling true story of the heinous murder of Karlie Pearce-Stevenson and daughter Khandalyce and how the case was cracked. How did two girls go missing for seven years and nobody noticed? In August 2010, dirt bike riders discovered human bones in the notorious Belanglo State Forest, where Ivan Milat had so cruelly tortured and slain seven young backpackers. The remains were those of a young woman, who the police dubbed 'Angel' after a T-shirt emblazoned with the word 'Angelic' that was found near the body.

It's Saturday, and everything is different. No, I didn't go to the market this morning, and I didn't have my usual coffee on Westerstraat. And no, I wasn't getting ready for a new semester at college. Next Monday, January 31, I have to admit myself at the hospital for my first chemotherapy session. For the next two months, I'm expected each week for a fresh shot of vincristine, etoposide, ifosfamide, and loads more exciting abracadabra.

The Girl with the Self-Esteem Issues is the remarkable story of Rosie Mercado’s journey from helplessness to becoming a model, life coach, and daytime celebrity and one of the “top 25 most powerful Latinas” (People). But as Rosie reveals, that success came after years of pain.

Terrified after her father's arrest by the Nazis, Ruth flees to Belgium. This is the unbelievable autobiographical story of Ruth Uzrad, a Jewish teenager whose life was turned upside down by the Nazi regime. After her father was arrested one night from their Berlin apartment by the Gestapo, Ruth's mother sends 13-year-old Ruth and her two younger sisters out on their escape route across Europe by train to the safety of Belgium. But then the Nazis also reach Belgium, driving Ruth into the French Jewish underground....

A modern girl is nothing without her squad of besties. But don't let all the hashtags fool you: The #girlsquad goes back a long, long time. In this hilarious and heartfelt audiobook, geek girl Sam Maggs takes you on a tour of some of history's most famous female BFFs.

It's 1985 in a small factory town near Pittsburgh. Eight-year-old Karen's parents are lifelong workers at the Anchor Glass plant, where one Saturday, an employee goes on a shooting spree, killing four supervisors, then himself. This event splits the young girl's life open, and like her mother, she begins to seek comfort in obsessive rituals and superstitions. This beautifully evocative memoir chronicles the next 14 years, as Karen moves through girlhood, adolescence, and young adulthood.

Over 40 years, two British police units acted undercover to infiltrate activist groups. At least 20 of those officers deliberately targeted women and entered relationships with them. One of those women was me. This is my story.

A Girl Called Beauty is a passion project belonging to first-time published author Susan (Scully) Hetrick, who started writing in sixth grade. Even at an early age, Susie had challenges and struggles well beyond those of a normal childhood, and wondered if everyone lived the way she did. But undaunted by life's tangled paths, Susie pressed on. After being handed even more obstacles, she realized that life had thrown enough at her to fill a book, so she started writing.

The China Lake missile range is located in a huge stretch of the Mojave Desert, about the size of the state of Delaware. It was created during the Second World War, and has always been shrouded in secrecy. But people who make missiles and other weapons are regular working people, with domestic routines and everyday dilemmas, and four of them were Karen Piper's parents, her sister, and - when she needed summer jobs - herself.

In late 2019, Sylvia Patterson was a celebrated pop journalist, still merrily writing about the musical greats. But with the diagnosis of a life-threatening disease, a global pandemic and the collapse of her industry, life was about to take a drastic turn. It was a misadventure that would teach her many things. The power of friendship, the shock of mortality and what happens when love is tested. How a walk in the park, a spontaneous dance and a TV hero can save your life. How your perspective can shift on everything, from work, family and music, to what truly makes you happy.

Lainie Chait was diagnosed with epilepsy in 1991 at the age of 19. At the time of diagnosis, there were three roads to go down—avoidance, acceptance or rebellion. Avoidance was her first choice. Falling in the shower, brain jerks and muscle twitches when she was 14 was the beginning of something 'not quite right' about her early teenage years. She hid these symptoms from family and friends for three years in the hope that they were just ‘growing pains’.

Jan Mendoza was one of the first few female firefighters to work for the California Department of Forestry. The year was 1978, and there were only 26 girls working for CDF in the entire state that year. A female had never stepped foot to work at Jan's assigned Northern California CDF station in its 50-year history! It was definitely a man's world, and some weren't happy when an 18-year-old girl who stood five feet two inches tall and weighed 95 pounds showed up for duty.

When 16-year-old Mytrae Meliana and her family emigrate from India to the US, she is determined to avoid the arranged marriage her family expects her to have, and to create her own destiny. But when she falls in love with an American man, her family drags the talented graduate student back to India and keeps her hostage.

Growing up on welfare, food stamps, and Greyhound buses, Holly Thompson Rehder quit school at fifteen to help take care of her mother and younger sister after a devastating car accident. Getting married and pregnant soon thereafter, Holly decided that the life she had been born into was not what she intended to give her child. Two decades later she was a successful businesswoman. And today, she is a rising political star who serves as an inspiration to young women across the state of Missouri—and indeed, the entire nation—all while never forgetting where she came from.

Wryly humorous and scarifyingly honest, Coolamon Girl is a beautifully crafted memoir of a daughter terrified of her mother. Scarred by her mother's conservatism and palpable dislike of her body and her sexuality, Di escapes her fraught home life and the stultifying narrowness of her 1950s and '60s small country town. Feeling lost in the big outside world, she travels the bumpy journey into adulthood full of adolescent doubts and fears--how she looks, how others see her, how to navigate sex and love. And finally, she discovers what she values as a woman.