Member Reviews
Katie Nelson and Olivia Meikle, the creative forces behind the *What'sHerName Podcast*, have truly gifted us with a remarkable book, *What's Her Name*. This isn’t just another history book; it’s a heartfelt collection that brings to light the lives of incredible women who have been overlooked in our historical narratives.
With genuine enthusiasm and careful research, Nelson and Meikle introduce us to a diverse array of characters—ancient queens, pioneering scientists, revolutionary artists, and brave activists. Each woman's story is told with such vivid detail and engaging storytelling that it’s hard to set the book down.
What truly makes *What's Her Name* stand out is how approachable it is. The authors combine solid scholarship with a warm, conversational style, avoiding dense academic jargon. It feels like sitting down for a captivating chat with passionate friends eager to share their discoveries.
This book goes beyond a simple collection of biographies; it’s a powerful call to action. By highlighting these extraordinary women, Nelson and Meikle encourage us to reevaluate our understanding of history and to recognize and celebrate women’s contributions throughout time.
Whether you're a history enthusiast or simply someone curious to learn about the women who have shaped our world, *What's Her Name* is a must-read. It serves as a poignant reminder that history is more vibrant and diverse than we often acknowledge, and the stories of women deserve the attention they have long been denied.
Although this was very detailed it was easy to read and follow.
I like a book that I can learn from and this was definitely that.
Some great women described and ones I now need to know more about.
Thank you for this copy to read and review
Amazing and informative book, really easy to read with an informal, funny narrative. Thoroughly enjoyed and will definitely recommend
I kindly received an ARC of this book by the publisher.
This was a great & informative book. I loved the language used as the author showed connection with the reader by involving them but also informing them.
The book explores various women from all around the world and in chronological order. I definitely learned something new.
Overall, a book I would recommend to anyone as I feel as though this caters to children but also teenagers & adults. It would be good if they had this in school libraries.
If you ever did history in school, you might have felt like the whole thing was a little disjointed - a little bit of patchwork, almost like 50% of it just... disappeared.
Turns out, that 50% consists of the women "tucked into dark, dusty corners" of history.
I thought I was reading a book with several different essays about great women in history - what I got was better: the essays all interlinked! In fact, it was more of a narrative of world history, with a focus on the forgotten women, than simply a series of essays. How I loved it. Suddenly, world history flows. Suddenly, the gaps are filled.
The tone is snarky and enjoyable to read, and the diversity of characters is refreshing. The authors promised forgotten women - and truly, more than 90% of them were truly women I had never heard of. Many of them morally grey, others complex, taking a turn for the despotic after their initial success. The authors don't hold back when the great women they write of, had questionable politics. All are viewed by the same eagle's eye, and treated to the same sharp tongue.
Read it, read it, read it. And if you can get a physical copy: do it!
What’s Her Name: A History Of The World In 70 Lost Women is a new history book from the hosts of the What’s Her Name history podcast Katie Nelson and Olivia Meikle.
Starting from the Stone Age and taking us on a historical journey right through to modern day, there’s something for everyone. With the role of women consistently underrepresented in history books, it was great to be introduced to eighty women who have played significant roles in historical events and time periods yet have been largely forgotten by time. I’d only actually heard of two of the eighty women prior to reading so was fascinated by their stories and it was great to see women from all walks of life represented. There is also fantastic imagery to illustrate the points.
I was more engaged with the second half of the book than the first but that’s purely personal preference as my interest generally lies more with modern history than ancient history. It was an easy book to dip in and out of over the course of a few weeks and it did prompt me to enter an internet research hole looking deeper into the stories of some of the women. I would have perhaps liked the further reading lists to have been longer, and shared at the end of each specific section rather than just in a full bibliography at the end.
Unfortunately, there were times when it felt like the information was being dumbed down and explained through pop culture references (such as likening a grand ancient debate to a Facebook fight), as surely that’s the only way the average female brain could understand more complex historical concepts. Whilst on one hand I could understand this as an attempt to make history accessible to a wider range of women, it generally just felt like an insult to female intelligence in what should have been an empowering book written by female historians.
The general tone of the book is very chatty, I’m assuming in an attempt to keep in the tone of the podcast, and this didn’t always work unfortunately. I also didn’t like the use of frequent “what if” and “what do you think happened?” sections. Although a bit of speculation is always good and part of the course with a history book as we don’t know the answer to everything, this took it a bit too far.
I would particularly recommend this book to YA readers interested in history or anyone who wants a non-fiction history book which is easy to dip in and out of.
Rating:⭐️⭐️⭐️/5
I have posted my review on my blog www.yourschloe.co.uk
*Thank you to NetGalley, Olivia Meikle & Katie Nelson and Michael O'Mara Limited.
Easy to read, but packed with fascinating information, "What's Her Name" is a whistle stop tour through human history focusing on the woman that made it. From the earliest of civilisations, through empire building and enlightenment to the Atomic Age, Nelson and Meikle relate the tales of 80 women and the incredible impact they had on the world around them. There is great representation from a variety of cultures and some really interesting historical questions to ponder. Highly recommended.
The ‘women’s history listicle’ is a strangely specific book category, but there have been more and more examples in recent years. It’s a solid concept for a book: write a number of short essays on various female historical figures, stick them in chronological order, voila! I’ve read many of these books, and I’m confident in saying that this is one of the best.
Rather than presenting the various women included as unrelated figures, this book tells a narrative of the whole of human history through the eyes of these women. You can visualise the camera zooming in and out of different parts of the world as we travel through history via 80 different case studies.
With that in mind, I was particularly impressed by the diversity of the women featured. A very clear effort was made to explore all corners of the globe, and examine how life and expectations for women around the world varied.
In many cases not much was known about the women featured, and I really liked how the authors embraced speculation and the unknown. It was always clear where the evidence for each woman’s life ran dry, and the various fates speculated varied from the likely to the absurd, often with a tongue-in-cheek outlook on history. The tone was often light-hearted, and reminded me a lot of Horrible Histories – just for adults!
This is a welcome addition to any women’s history shelf, celebrating the ordinary and the extraordinary in equal measure.
I received a free copy for an honest review.
What’s Her Name by Katie Nelson; Olivia Meikle; What'sHerName Podcast is the History of the World in 80 Lost Women. This book is a journey through thousands of years of human history.
From the earliest human civilisations through to the present day, these stories are of countless influential women, leaders, artists, warriors, scientists and so much more.
You may not have heard of Fatima al-Fihri who was an Islamic World visionary who founded the world's first university. Or Ching Shih the most successful pirate in history, or Huda Sha'arawi a pioneering Egyptian feminist leader, suffragist, nationalist, and founder of the Egyptian Feminist Union.
Within this book the authors who are sisters – Olivia Meikle and Katie Nelson weave together the captivating stories of these fascinating figures to tell an alternative, enthralling and deeply researched historical narrative.
A truly global history, What’s Her Name features biographies of incredible women spanning six continents and thousands of years, from Ancient Egypt and the Roman Empire to imperial China, the Americas and post-war Europe. Drawing on years of study and interviews with dozens of experts, this is an entertaining, thought-provoking look at the trailblazing women you may not have heard of.
This was an interesting book.
The download date was unfortunately missed, I would be happy to re-review it if it became available again. I have awarded stars for the book cover and description as they both appeal to me. I would be more than happy to re-read and review if a download becomes available. If you would like me to re-review please feel free to contact me at thesecretbookreview@gmail.com or via social media The_secret_bookreview (Instagram) or Secret_bookblog (Twitter). Thank you.
WHAT'S HER NAME is a rapid fire tour of human history through the eyes of women often overlooked in the record.
As with all global histories (particularly single volume, sub-300 pages ones), the book has to take a whistle-stop tour through history. Hundreds of years will pass in a few pages, jumping country to country to try an give a general sense of what's going on in that region. This is the standard way (and only way) to approach such an undertaking and WHAT'S HER NAME handles it with casual aplomb.
It covers a fair amount of the world, not just focusing on the West (as can often happen.) I liked that it did bounce between countries to see what was happening in Asia and Africa and South America and the Pacific Islands. So many books promise to be global and then only touch on non-Western countries when the West turns up to invade and conquer.
This is a book that grew out of a podcast and you can tell. There is a very informal style to the writing, like transcriptions from a podcast. It is very colloquial in tone, with "options" for theories ("which one of these reasons do you want to believe?") and lots of rhetorical questions.
In all, it's a fun, informative look at global history from a female perspective.
What's Her Name by Katie Nelson and Olivia Meikle is a fascinating history read based on the podcast by the same name and hosted by the authors. I chose to read the book because I was intrigued by the promise of hearing the untold stories of women through the ages and I was not disappointed. The book described the lives and cultural impact of approximately 80 women from all around the globe and through time from the earliest recorded human history to the modern day , telling the stories of queens and scientists, warriors and artists in a simple almost conversational style that gives a good overview and invites the reader to dig deeper if they choose. The book is quite light hearted in tone, in keeping with the tone of the podcast that inspired it, but I quite liked it, it made it an inviting book to dip in and out of when I had ten minutes to spare, and it is a book that can be enjoyed just as much in this way as when read from cover to cover. While I was familiar with some of the women discussed there were many that I had never heard of, and so I found myself learning while being entertained, what more could I ask for?
I read and reviewed an ARC courtesy of NetGalley and the publisher, all opinions are my own.
Short profiles of women from the earliest civilisations to the Twentieth Century in a chatty sort of style, a bit like a stand-up comedian (but without the punchline). It addresses the fact that history has been written by men and has ignored all matriarchal societies and some fascinating women. I did however feel that some of the sentiments were unnecessarily anti-male.
I voluntarily read and reviewed an advanced copy of this book from NetGalley. All thoughts and opinions are my own.
The role of women in history is consistently under represented. I usually welcome any venture which identifies and highlights memorable achievements by women which are unknown. This title had so much potential; exploring 80 women from the Stone Age to South African apartheid. I’m sure that a great deal of work has gone into researching the subjects, but the narrative doesn’t work for me at all. Instead of being informed I’ve found it irritating. There’s a lot of ‘what if’, ‘wouldn’t it be funny’ and other speculative content which is chatty and feels frivolous. I understand it’s based on a podcast and that’s a fact that’s pushed. There are some illustrative plates and a bibliography (limited). The latter is more interesting than some of the content of the book. I didn’t enjoy this title at all.
This book is special as is the project that it represents.
The book shows progress so far in mining into the hidden histories that the rulers of the past have not wanted us to know about.
The stories all centre on women, usually remarkable women.
The book leans heavily on the What's Her name podcast, but stands on its own as the state of play at this particular point of time.
I wish the whole project every success and thank everyone involved for opening my eyes to even more tall tales told by the powers that be.
A jocular history of forgotten women from the Stone Age onwards. I’ve been dipping into this book, reading one women’s story at a time. It’s written like a podcast, which is how it started off. Sometimes this works, sometimes it’s confusing. There are lots of interesting facts eg about different Creation stories from around the world. A fun read rather than an academic one.
I really enjoyed this book, its not the normal kind of book i would pick up so thank you Netgalley and the publisher for the opportunity to review. I lost myself in it which i think is the best outcome for any kind of book
3 stars
I didn’t like this book, purely due to its pointlessness. I love historical books, especially about strong women, but this book read more like the random musings inside someone’s head. The book starts as it means to go on by saying things like we don’t know at all about this, but maybe this could’ve been true and if that it’s true… before leading you down the rabbit hole on a subject that was just a random musing. If the author had provided some sources to at least add some weight to their musings it could’ve been a passable book, but as it stands it’s just an unreliable witness
Even though the topic and all historical details were highly interesting, I felt that the way it was presented as a book did not work. It was not pleasant to read. Indeed, it was originally a podcast and it did feel like one. It was difficult to take the "writer" seriously because all the little comments meant orally felt clumsy in the form of a book.
I received a digital copy of this book and I am leaving voluntarily an honest review.
From the Venus figures found from the Stone Age, to various women from the Pythia to Ancient Egyptian females, this book is full of stories about women I have never heard of and is a wonderful and scholarly work , spanning continents and timeliness, mixing theories with mythology. I am very impressed by the work. Highly recommended.