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alexxrose's review against another edition
dark
informative
sad
slow-paced
4.0
Content Warnings
Graphic: Gore, Chronic illness, Death, and Medical content
Moderate: Miscarriage, Grief, and Cancer
Minor: Abortion, War, Pregnancy, and Domestic abuse
gingerlaura's review against another edition
dark
emotional
informative
inspiring
medium-paced
4.25
<i><b>Lip... Dip... Paint.</i></b>
This is such an important story to be told. It's not only about thousands of victims due to radium poisoning, it's also about determination, perseverance, being united and standing for justice.
It was absolutely heartbreaking to read the story about the Radium Girls. They suffered badly, and no one would listen to them for a long, long time. They were hard working women, just trying to make a living, and oblivious to the fact that radium was, in fact, poisonous. The company was actively ignoring the problem too, because even though radium was a new element to work with, it's danger had long been established in literature before the dial-paining factories were build.
<b><i>That was the tragedy. Radium had been known to be harmful since 1901. Every death since was unnecessary.</i></b>
The fact that the company failed to acknowledge the hazards of radium poisoning, fought the girls tooth and nail while the evidence was <i>right there</i>, is what made my heart break for the girls. They sabotaged medical examinations, fought every case in court under the name of 'radium isn't poisonous', they made evidence disappear and made up fake reports. I cannot express how angry I am that innocent women had to put up with this. I can only admire their strength for standing up for what they thought was right; even when they only had a few months left to live they still stood their ground in court.
<b>Tom watched his wife from the doorway; watched as she demonstrated how she had been killed. Though he had thought himself wrung out of tears, he wept quietly, unashamedly, as Catherine showed off the simple movement that had left her little more than a living corpse.</i></b>
The girls fought hard, even when it seemed hopeless, but in the end it did pay off. They got their justice, and I couldn't be more happy for them. Even if it was too late, in the end the women won and got the justice they deserved. They not only won, but because they also donated their bodies to science they taught the world a lot about radium and what radioactivity does to the body in general. They also caused laws to be put into place for a safe work place, we have them to thank for it:
<b><i>The dial-painters' case ultimately led to the establishment of the Occupational Safety and Health Administration, which now works nationally in the United States to ensure safe working conditions.</i></b>
Even though the dial-paining companies have long been closed down, the results of actively ignoring the radium problems are still felt today. After a lot of sick patients could be directly linked to the factory, it was ultimately demolished. This demolishing was easier said than done unfortunately, because radium is still found in that place till this day.
<b><i>It was an operation that would take decades; in 2015, the clean-up was still going on.</b></i>
Like I said before, I think this is an important story to be told and I learned a lot from reading this book. I can recommend it to anyone, it's quite an unknown tragedy even though it had a big impact on society.
The only thing I didn't enjoy about this was the writing style. Though I do think it's important to name as many of the radium girls by name as to not to forget them, mentioning a new one and describing their hair color, eye color, personalities and boyfriends every other sentence became a bit overwhelming. I didn't really know who was who anymore, which is unfortunate. On top of that the time and place of things got a bit jumbled too sometimes, which caused me to be confused at times.
Anyways, go read this book!
This is such an important story to be told. It's not only about thousands of victims due to radium poisoning, it's also about determination, perseverance, being united and standing for justice.
It was absolutely heartbreaking to read the story about the Radium Girls. They suffered badly, and no one would listen to them for a long, long time. They were hard working women, just trying to make a living, and oblivious to the fact that radium was, in fact, poisonous. The company was actively ignoring the problem too, because even though radium was a new element to work with, it's danger had long been established in literature before the dial-paining factories were build.
<b><i>That was the tragedy. Radium had been known to be harmful since 1901. Every death since was unnecessary.</i></b>
The fact that the company failed to acknowledge the hazards of radium poisoning, fought the girls tooth and nail while the evidence was <i>right there</i>, is what made my heart break for the girls. They sabotaged medical examinations, fought every case in court under the name of 'radium isn't poisonous', they made evidence disappear and made up fake reports. I cannot express how angry I am that innocent women had to put up with this. I can only admire their strength for standing up for what they thought was right; even when they only had a few months left to live they still stood their ground in court.
<b>Tom watched his wife from the doorway; watched as she demonstrated how she had been killed. Though he had thought himself wrung out of tears, he wept quietly, unashamedly, as Catherine showed off the simple movement that had left her little more than a living corpse.</i></b>
The girls fought hard, even when it seemed hopeless, but in the end it did pay off. They got their justice, and I couldn't be more happy for them. Even if it was too late, in the end the women won and got the justice they deserved. They not only won, but because they also donated their bodies to science they taught the world a lot about radium and what radioactivity does to the body in general. They also caused laws to be put into place for a safe work place, we have them to thank for it:
<b><i>The dial-painters' case ultimately led to the establishment of the Occupational Safety and Health Administration, which now works nationally in the United States to ensure safe working conditions.</i></b>
Even though the dial-paining companies have long been closed down, the results of actively ignoring the radium problems are still felt today. After a lot of sick patients could be directly linked to the factory, it was ultimately demolished. This demolishing was easier said than done unfortunately, because radium is still found in that place till this day.
<b><i>It was an operation that would take decades; in 2015, the clean-up was still going on.</b></i>
Like I said before, I think this is an important story to be told and I learned a lot from reading this book. I can recommend it to anyone, it's quite an unknown tragedy even though it had a big impact on society.
The only thing I didn't enjoy about this was the writing style. Though I do think it's important to name as many of the radium girls by name as to not to forget them, mentioning a new one and describing their hair color, eye color, personalities and boyfriends every other sentence became a bit overwhelming. I didn't really know who was who anymore, which is unfortunate. On top of that the time and place of things got a bit jumbled too sometimes, which caused me to be confused at times.
Anyways, go read this book!
Content Warnings
Moderate: Medical trauma, Chronic illness, Medical content, Terminal illness, Cancer, Death, and Gore
jonie_rich's review against another edition
dark
inspiring
reflective
sad
tense
medium-paced
4.5
I thought this was beautifully written! Be that as it may, you’re going to have to be in a good headspace to read this. It is grotesque, heartbreaking, infuriating, and chilling. The post script genuinely caused me to gasp. I had to take a break a couple of days in and read something else for a little while. However, I absolutely recommend this book, especially if this is a subject or a time period that you’re interested in. The author clearly did her research. I learned a lot while I was reading it and found it very compelling.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Death of parent, Body horror, Cancer, Chronic illness, Emotional abuse, Child death, Bullying, Confinement, Gore, Mental illness, Blood, Misogyny, Pregnancy, Sexism, Suicidal thoughts, Miscarriage, Animal death, Death, Gaslighting, Terminal illness, Grief, Infertility, Injury/Injury detail, Medical content, and Medical trauma
shan2's review against another edition
dark
emotional
sad
medium-paced
4.25
Content Warnings
Graphic: Cancer, Death, Gore, Body horror, Injury/Injury detail, Medical trauma, and Terminal illness
Minor: Domestic abuse
diannaphantomfiction's review against another edition
dark
emotional
hopeful
informative
reflective
sad
slow-paced
4.75
My only issue with this book was the length. While I understand telling the full story, at times the chapters seemed to drag.
Otherwise, it has been a long time since I read a story that made me feel all the emotions possible, from disgust to hope. This was an absolutely wonderful read.
Otherwise, it has been a long time since I read a story that made me feel all the emotions possible, from disgust to hope. This was an absolutely wonderful read.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Medical trauma, Chronic illness, Ableism, Death, Classism, Injury/Injury detail, Suicidal thoughts, Sexism, Body horror, and Cancer
Moderate: Infertility, Body horror, Gore, and Miscarriage
Minor: Domestic abuse
This is all true, so it will feel fairly heavy at times, but all of this present, sometimes in graphic detailfeatherface's review against another edition
Recommended for people who enjoy historical fiction rather than non-fiction.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Gore and Medical content
billiema3's review against another edition
challenging
dark
informative
reflective
sad
tense
medium-paced
4.5
Content Warnings
Graphic: Gore, Medical trauma, Medical content, and Death
cuteasamuntin's review against another edition
emotional
informative
reflective
sad
tense
medium-paced
5.0
I think the first time I cried while reading this was only a chapter or two in. At some point, I simply didn’t bother to wipe my eyes anymore. I found myself filled with righteous anger and furious anguish, unable to find my footing in the accustomed professional distance I have cultivated in my own career as a historian. Please note that the rest of this review contains spoilers consisting of readily-available historical information and references.
Going into this book, I had a passing familiarity with the Radium Girls and a pre-existing understanding of the long history of companies disregarding the welfare of their employees and customers in the name of profit. I thought I understood the Radium Girls’ role in the US developing stronger workers’ safety protections, accompanied by the description of teenage girls painting their teeth and nails with radium paint so they would glow. I knew they were lied to and that they died, but I’d always had the vague impression that it was perhaps 20 or so young women who died of radiation poisoning before they reached 30.
Kate Moore did an incredible job of honoring the lives and memories of the many, many women who were lied to, irreparably harmed, and emotionally abused and gaslit by their employers from the moment their work began in the early 1920s through their deaths at ages ranging from their teens to their nineties. Moore’s rage and grief at the injustice done to the America’s “ghost girls” is palpable throughout. Unlike I’ve experienced with many other works of popular history, I found this to bolster, rather than detract from, the narrative as it unfolded.
I was both professionally impressed and personally moved by Moore’s dedication to thorough research through compiling existing primary sources and performing her own oral history interviews of people related to the Radium Girls. She synthesized these sources into a cohesive and compelling narrative of US labor history. Moore clearly delineates between known facts and her own conjectures of intimate details or internal thoughts based on available evidence. Rather than distracting, I found Moore’s frequent integration of direct quotations from archival materials and her own interviews to be a powerful tool that also made me more willing to trust the points where she had to guess at missing details or the internal workings of the entities involved in this history.
While the work is densely packed with both immediately vital and contextually relevant but tangential information, I did not at any point find the major points obscured or the pacing to be slow or bogged down.
I find I have few words of my own to describe the companies who knew they were poisoning their employees and the towns around them, then lied, slandered, and cheated these people into their early, irradiated graves. Over 100 years later, we are still cleaning up after them. This book is a well-deserved memorial for the women whose pain and suffering led to better protections for workers and the entirety of the American public. May their memories be a blessing.
Going into this book, I had a passing familiarity with the Radium Girls and a pre-existing understanding of the long history of companies disregarding the welfare of their employees and customers in the name of profit. I thought I understood the Radium Girls’ role in the US developing stronger workers’ safety protections, accompanied by the description of teenage girls painting their teeth and nails with radium paint so they would glow. I knew they were lied to and that they died, but I’d always had the vague impression that it was perhaps 20 or so young women who died of radiation poisoning before they reached 30.
Kate Moore did an incredible job of honoring the lives and memories of the many, many women who were lied to, irreparably harmed, and emotionally abused and gaslit by their employers from the moment their work began in the early 1920s through their deaths at ages ranging from their teens to their nineties. Moore’s rage and grief at the injustice done to the America’s “ghost girls” is palpable throughout. Unlike I’ve experienced with many other works of popular history, I found this to bolster, rather than detract from, the narrative as it unfolded.
I was both professionally impressed and personally moved by Moore’s dedication to thorough research through compiling existing primary sources and performing her own oral history interviews of people related to the Radium Girls. She synthesized these sources into a cohesive and compelling narrative of US labor history. Moore clearly delineates between known facts and her own conjectures of intimate details or internal thoughts based on available evidence. Rather than distracting, I found Moore’s frequent integration of direct quotations from archival materials and her own interviews to be a powerful tool that also made me more willing to trust the points where she had to guess at missing details or the internal workings of the entities involved in this history.
While the work is densely packed with both immediately vital and contextually relevant but tangential information, I did not at any point find the major points obscured or the pacing to be slow or bogged down.
I find I have few words of my own to describe the companies who knew they were poisoning their employees and the towns around them, then lied, slandered, and cheated these people into their early, irradiated graves. Over 100 years later, we are still cleaning up after them. This book is a well-deserved memorial for the women whose pain and suffering led to better protections for workers and the entirety of the American public. May their memories be a blessing.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Death, Grief, Body horror, Medical content, Terminal illness, Injury/Injury detail, Chronic illness, and Gaslighting
Minor: Bullying, Cancer, Miscarriage, War, Fire/Fire injury, Infertility, Blood, Misogyny, Death of parent, and Gore
Moderate to graphic descriptions ofmilesss's review against another edition
dark
emotional
informative
inspiring
sad
tense
fast-paced
5.0
Multiple times while reading I was moved to tears. An incredible account I could hardly put down. Engaging and emotional with attention to detail and honesty.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Blood, Terminal illness, Sexism, Injury/Injury detail, Misogyny, Chronic illness, Death, Gore, and Cancer
Moderate: Grief, Medical content, Eating disorder, Infertility, Death of parent, Gaslighting, and Miscarriage
Minor: Abortion, War, and Suicidal thoughts
mondovertigo's review against another edition
dark
informative
sad
medium-paced
5.0
Content Warnings
Graphic: Miscarriage, Gaslighting, Death, Blood, Terminal illness, Chronic illness, Medical trauma, Medical content, Misogyny, Injury/Injury detail, Infertility, Grief, Gore, and Cancer
Moderate: War
Minor: Abortion