Unsuitable for Ladies: An Anthology of Women Travellers

This is a themed selection of excerpts, arranged geographically, all by women travellers. Other than an introduction, then a ‘Setting Out' chapter, and a final ‘Coming Home' chapter, the excerpts are arranged by the place they occur - sort of by continent, but Europe is split up much further.

The source material is great - all those incredible women travellers of high achievement (only picking a few of my favourites) such as: Ella Maillart, Ethel Manin, Freya Stark, Isabella Bird and including some of the more modern women travellers - Robyn Davidson, Christina Dodwell, Marika Hanbury-Tenison, Dervla Murphy & Betina Selby. There are many, many others.

I have to say the format of this book didn't engage with me. Although proposed by the author as a dip-in type book, it isn't in my nature to read that way. Reading it cover to cover, I found it hard to get the continuity with the short excerpts, and this effected my rating. Where I probably benefited more from this book is the list of source material - where I have added a few books to my list ‘to source'.

Still a solid 3 stars.