Kate Moore (Writer and editor)

Ordinary women in 1920s America. All they wanted was the chance to shine. Be careful what you wish for. 'The first thing we asked was, "Does this stuff hurt you?" And they said, "No." The company said that it wasn't dangerous, that we didn't need to be afraid.' 1917. As a war raged across the world, young American women flocked to work, painting watches, clocks and military dials with a special luminous substance made from radium. It was a fun job, lucrative and glamorous - the girls themselves shone brightly in the dark, covered head to toe in the dust from the paint. They were the radium girls. As the years passed, the women began to suffer from mysterious and crippling illnesses. The very thing that had made them feel alive - their work - was in fact slowly killing them: they had been poisoned by the radium paint. Yet their employers denied all responsibility. And so, in the face of unimaginable suffering - in the face of death - these courageous women refused to accept their fate quietly, and instead became determined to fight for justice. Drawing on previously unpublished sources - including diaries, letters and court transcripts, as well as original interviews with the women's relatives - The Radium Girls is an intimate narrative account of an unforgettable true story. It is the powerful tale of a group of ordinary women from the Roaring Twenties, who themselves learned how to roar.

They Paid with Their Lives, Their Final Fight was for Justice

The Radium Girls

When Felix arrived at Huddersfield train station as an eight-week-old kitten, no one knew just how important this little ball of fluff would become. Although she has a vital job to do as "senior pest controller", Felix is much more than just an employee of TransPennine Express. For Felix has changed the lives of her colleagues and the station's commuters in surprising ways. Felix seems to have a remarkable ability to save the day time and time again: from bringing a boy with autism out of his shell, to providing comfort to a runaway child shivering on the platform one night. But it's a chance friendship with a commuter who she waits for on the platform every morning that finally gives Felix the recognition she deserves, catapulting her to international stardom...

Felix the Railway Cat

From the day she was born until she escaped aged 30, Katy Morgan-Davies knew nothing but a life in captivity. Her father was the deluded and cruel leader of a cult based in South London who convinced himself that he was a god, and the immortal leader of the world. Her father's paranoia and his need to completely control those around him led to her being imprisoned indoors with the curtains drawn most of the time, denied any kind of love or friendship. From a young age, Katy's father subjected her to violence and mental abuse. She was not permitted contact with anyone outside the house and on the rare occasions she did have to go out, she was always chaperoned. When she did finally engineer her escape, though, she realised just how little she knew of the world outside her front door. She had never before done the things we take for granted every day such as travelling in a car or paying for something in a shop. Step by step, she learned the skills she needed in order to exist in a world that was completely unfamiliar to her. In this unique and powerful memoir, we see how Katy rose above what she suffered and found a way to freedom through her love of books.

Kate Moore (Writer and editor)

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