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130 reviews for:
The Radium Girls: The Scary But True Story of the Poison That Made People Glow in the Dark
Kate Moore
4.24 AVERAGE
130 reviews for:
The Radium Girls: The Scary But True Story of the Poison That Made People Glow in the Dark
Kate Moore
4.24 AVERAGE
From YouTube I knew about the radium girls and their story. I initially checked out this book because I wanted to know more about them, hear their story in depth. But I never got around to reading it because something told me I wouldn’t be able to get through it. Maybe someday in the future I’ll decide to pick up the book and properly give these women the attention their stories deserve. But now I’m in a place where I need content that will help me escape reality, not remind me of how awful this world can be.
dark
emotional
informative
medium-paced
Content Warnings
Graphic: Ableism, Cancer, Chronic illness, Death, Gore, Misogyny, Sexism, Terminal illness, Blood, Medical content, Grief, Medical trauma, Injury/Injury detail, Classism
This story is heartbreaking yet so intriguing to read. History is dark and scary and this only proves it. Women doing their jobs to the best of their ability lost their jaws, their health and their life. It's brutal and scary!
This story is important to tell. I can't express it enough how insanely important it is to learn about these stories and learn from their mistakes. These women died but they don't need to die in vain. We need to learn to take care of each other and be as ethical as we can. Because, man... this book hurt. These excited young women just doing their best...
The scientific discoveries, the law suits, the fight to make sure radium poisoning was understood.... This book is one for the ages.
I haven't read the original YA Radium Girls, but this take was high on my radar because of the original. I can't tell if it holds up or if it's any better, but this book as a singular work is great! It's a long book for young readers though, just be aware.
Five out of five stars.
Thank you to NetGalley and SourceBooks for providing me a free copy of this book in exchange of an honest review.
This story is important to tell. I can't express it enough how insanely important it is to learn about these stories and learn from their mistakes. These women died but they don't need to die in vain. We need to learn to take care of each other and be as ethical as we can. Because, man... this book hurt. These excited young women just doing their best...
The scientific discoveries, the law suits, the fight to make sure radium poisoning was understood.... This book is one for the ages.
I haven't read the original YA Radium Girls, but this take was high on my radar because of the original. I can't tell if it holds up or if it's any better, but this book as a singular work is great! It's a long book for young readers though, just be aware.
Five out of five stars.
Thank you to NetGalley and SourceBooks for providing me a free copy of this book in exchange of an honest review.
dark
emotional
informative
sad
tense
This is the young reader's edition of Kate Moore's Radium Girls, but it was a very thorough account of the women who glowed with radium after painting clock faces with radium paint and their heroic fight for justice against the companies responsible for their poisoning. Excellent book and I would recommend it to anyone interested in history and learning more about these women. I might go and read the original version now.
dark
informative
sad
slow-paced
This was a fascinating read! I knew a little about the Radium girls but this shed so much light on this lost history. This is specifically the young readers editions meant for high elementary and middle school students. I really liked reading this edition because the information was succient and easy to understand. Though this book is definitely for more advanced readers as there is a lot of information in this 300 page book.
The visuals add a lot to storyline, even though at times they are horrifying. The decision to spilt this book into three sections was a smart choice as it allowed for natural stoping points. This book really examines the way the watch companies exploited these girls and the horrors they faced. It is also a story about the resilience of these women and how they fought to get their lives and deaths justice.
This is a history often not taught in school and is a story of Medical malpractice and fighting for labor rights. This is an important book for everyone to read, but anyone who might be curious about the glowing girls should definitely read this
emotional
informative
reflective
sad
medium-paced
To begin with, while newspapers of the times may have called the women who used radioactive paint to paint clock dials "radium girls," we now live in a time when we should be calling them women, because they were. Many may have been young, yes, but they were still working women who don't deserve to be remembered with the belittling name of "girls." Moore used "girls" in her original edition of this book and does so even more in this "young readers' edition," and it's disrespectful and infuriating.
I've read the non-young-readers' edition of this book, and came away from this edition confused as to who the author and publisher think the young readers' edition is for. The regular edition is perfectly fine for average readers ages 13 or so and up, and this young readers' edition lifts whole passages out of it without change. At the at the same time, this new edition includes new text that is astonishingly condescending to readers of, say, 8 and older. So the target audience for this is very unclear. The cutesy material added to dial down the ages for the marketing of the book is pretty horrifying given the seriousness of the topic.
As in the original edition, too, the author spends a lot of time detailing how pretty the dial-painters were, as if their beauty is what made it so awful that they died in the ways that that did, rather than the fact that they were human beings who were routinely lied to in their workplaces. Whether their hairstyles were "cute" or their smiles "shy" is objectifying and irrelevant.
Finally, the writing just isn't very good. It's often repetitive and full of tired phrases and cliches, and not terribly compelling. I can't in any good faith recommend this book or its original edition because of these myriad issues.
I've read the non-young-readers' edition of this book, and came away from this edition confused as to who the author and publisher think the young readers' edition is for. The regular edition is perfectly fine for average readers ages 13 or so and up, and this young readers' edition lifts whole passages out of it without change. At the at the same time, this new edition includes new text that is astonishingly condescending to readers of, say, 8 and older. So the target audience for this is very unclear. The cutesy material added to dial down the ages for the marketing of the book is pretty horrifying given the seriousness of the topic.
As in the original edition, too, the author spends a lot of time detailing how pretty the dial-painters were, as if their beauty is what made it so awful that they died in the ways that that did, rather than the fact that they were human beings who were routinely lied to in their workplaces. Whether their hairstyles were "cute" or their smiles "shy" is objectifying and irrelevant.
Finally, the writing just isn't very good. It's often repetitive and full of tired phrases and cliches, and not terribly compelling. I can't in any good faith recommend this book or its original edition because of these myriad issues.