The Radium Girls: The Dark Story of America’s Shining Women in Around the World in 80 Books

May 21, 2018 Georgia Carvalho rated it liked it

Heartbreaking stories about the women who painted the glow in the dark watch dials in the early to mid 20th century, and the very irresponsible employers who used them and let them suffer the consequences. The book is full of personal and historical details, photos and documentation. It is completely heart-wrenching.

1 like · Like · see review

Feb 25, 2018 Kay Green rated it really liked it

Well written and researched book about the girls who painted radium dials on clocks, instruments and watches and then died of radium poisoning. But very hard to read. The author did justice to the stories of all these individual women, but their illnesses and deaths were gruesome and in the authors words they battled "dishonest companies, an indifferent industry, dismissive courts and a dismissive medical community" . It was so hard in retrospect to see how little attention was paid to these dea ...more

Like · see review

Oct 04, 2022 Jennifer rated it did not like it

I didn't get far in this book, just a few chapters. So much of the book was descriptions about the girls' (maybe the author refers to these young women to match the time period in which women were called girls) appearances. It was so distracting from the story. I don't care how short or long their hair was and what the characters thought their best features were. How about some substance about who these women were? The story was sacrificed to waste space on these unnecessary descriptions. ...more

Like · see review