Clarina Nichols: Frontier Crusader for Women’s Rights by Diane Eickhoff

I very enthusiastically endorse this detailed and exacting biography. It does not focus on a particularly well-known women’s rights advocate (I had never heard of her…) and as such makes for a rounded reading of history. There are photographs of famous contemporaries in each chapter. Nichols fought the good fight in staggering social justice arenas: abolition, temperance, suffrage. (For those who wince at the mention of temperance like I do, the feminists’ theory at the time was that anti-drinking laws would lessen the incidence of alcoholism in men, keeping them from drinking away their paypackets and inciting violence at home after.)

With Common Core’s focus on non-fiction, perhaps books like this will be one of many to fit the bill. It’s dense on text and very thoroughly researched, yet it’s still a story and far outside the dreary strictures of a textbook.

Clarina Nichols was published in March by Quindaro Press which focuses on historical non-fiction. At 240 pages, the reader range is anywhere from an interested and motivated seventh grader to late teen readers. As usual, I found a kids’ book a terrific resource at my age.