On Top of the World: Five Women Explorers in Tibet

Rating:
Summary: Women explorers - Found!
Review: An excellent book in that rather small group of books on women explorers. An entertaining read. Could be read by high school or possibly middle school readers but does not talk down to them. Discusses English lady travelers (Nina Mazuchelli, Annie Taylor, Isabella Bird Bishop), the American Fanny Bullock Workman and the French Alexandra David-Neel. Contains the amusing incident of competition between Fanny Bullock Workman and Annie Smith Peck. Since Peck's entire story is not told, she looks a bit like a doofus in this conflict. I suspect modern readers would find her more sympathetic if they knew the whole story. (Fanny looked down on Annie because she wore bloomers to climb mountains. Modern readers would find Fanny's insistence on mountain climbing in long skirts bizarre.)

The stories are told concisely but with sufficient detail for most readers. Appropriate maps and black and white photos increase the enjoyment of the text. I would recommend it to anyone interested in women's history or the history of Tibet or the history of mountain climbing.