Elizabeth Kerri Mahon

Scandalous Women is pleased to welcome Guest Blogger Talia Weisberg. Talia is a self-described radical feminist. She won the 2009 Regional National History Day competition with the entry Belva Lockwood: Unlocking Doors for Women, and calls Lockwood her role model. She also created an organization, Bleep!, whose mission is to eradicate the usage of cursing among kids and teens today (http://sites.google.com/site/bleeporganization). When one hears First-Wave Feminism or suffrage movement, one normally thinks of women like Susan B. Anthony and Elizabeth Cady Stanton. If you know more about the women’s rights movement, you might think of women like Alice Paul, and Carrie Chapman Catt. These are all women who made enormous contributions to the women’s rights movement, and their accomplishments should never be downplayed. However, there is another key player of the suffrage movement that has fallen into obscurity: Belva Lockwood. Belva Lockwood was born on October 24, 1830 to a traditio...

Anne Zaccardelli, Library and Online Sales Assistant, at the Oxford University Press alerted me to the paperback release of this book. Synopsis: In the quiet town of Seneca Falls, New York, over the course of two days in July, 1848, a small group of women and men, led by Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Lucretia Mott, held a convention that would launch the women's rights movement and change the course of history. In Seneca Falls and the Origins of the Women's Rights Movement, Sally McMillen reveals, for the first time, the full significance of that revolutionary convention and the enormous changes it produced. The book covers 50 years of women's activism, from 1840 to 1890, focusing on four extraordinary figures--Mott, Stanton, Lucy Stone, and Susan B. Anthony. McMillen tells the stories of their lives, how they came to take up the cause of women's rights, the astonishing advances they made during their lifetimes, and the far-reaching effects of the work they did. At th...

As you know, I don't really review historical romances on this blog, but I couldn't resist when Sourcebooks gave me the chance to review Laura Kinsale's first romance in 5 years. I was a huge Laura Kinsale fan back in the day when I devoured historical romance like Twizzlers. From the back cover: Trevelyn and Callie are childhood sweethearts with a taste for adventure. Until the fateful day her father discovers them embracing in the carriage and in a furious frenzy drives Trevelyn away in disgrace. Nine long, lonely years later, Trevelyn returns. Callie is shocked to discover that he can still make her blood race and fill her life with mischief, excitement and scandal. He would give her the world, but he can't give her the one thing she wants more than anything - himself. For Trevelyn, Callie is a spark of light in a world of darkness and deceit.  Before he can bear to say his last good-byes, he's determined to sweep her into one last, fateful adventure, just ...

I recently watched the American Master's program on Louisa May Alcott.  More a docurama, than a documentary Broadway actors Elizabeth Marvel and Daniel Gerroll played Louisa and Bronson respectively, recreating key moments in Alcott's life, using extracts from her journals and letters.  Afterwards, I was determined to learn more about this writer that I had only really known through Little Women . The program mentioned Harriet Reisen's new biography Louisa May Alcott: The Woman Behind Little Women . I immediately ran to the library to take out a copy.  After reading the book, I made wonder why Alcott is not taught in high school American Literature classes.  She belongs up there with other 19th century luminaries like Hawthorne, Melville and Henry James. While other popular 19th century authors are no longer read (Gertrude Atherton, Sarah Orne Jewett), LittleWomen has become a classic of American Literature and not just of YA fiction. Harriet Reisen's book ...

The Winner of Carrie Lofty's new release Scoundrel's Kiss is Johanne I will be emailing you shortly to get your address. Congratulations to the winner and to everyone that entered.

Betty Pack was blond, beautiful and a spy. Daring and courageous, she wasn’t afraid to her use her beauty as well as her brains in her quest for information that would help the British and the Americans in their fight against Hitler during WWII. She had the uncanny ability to target the right men in power, and then she seduced them. Recruited in 1938, she was active as a spy until 1944 when her cover was compromised. Betty’s contributions have been downplayed by some in the intelligence community because of the method in which she obtained it. They claim that others were able to pass on the same information. But Betty was able again and again to acquire information that her handlers considered to be of great value. Born on November 22, 1910 in Minneapolis, as Amy Elizabeth Thorpe, her family called her Betty. Her father was an officer in the United States Marines, by the time Betty was 9 years old she was well traveled, having lived in Cuba, Rhode Island, Florida as well as Hawaii. H...

Scandalous Women is pleased to welcome historical romance author Carrie Lofty to the blog. Carrie is the author of Scoundrel's Kiss which is released today. You can read my review of the book here . Q: Welcome Carrie to Scandalous Women! Tell us about a little about yourself and how you got started writing? I've been writing since I could string words into half-baked sentences. I started reading romance when I was 13, long about the time I became seriously interested in the history of the Old West. Writing historical romance was a perfect fit! But I floundered for years and years. I didn't have it in me to take my ambitions seriously. Then my husband went to graduate school, a degree program that sent him to Virginia for a summer internship. I stayed behind in Wisconsin with our two daughters. I realized that if I wanted to get back out in the world and have my place in the sun, I needed to become dedicated. I finished my first manuscript that summer, then sold the...

Lady Sings The Blues (1972) Paramount Pictures Directed by Sidney J. Furie Screenplay: Terence McCloy, Chris Clark & Suzanne de Passe Based on the book Lady Sings The Blues by Billie Holiday and William Duffy Cast Diana Ross - Billie Holiday Billy Dee Williams - Louis McKay Richard Pryor - Piano Man James T. Callahan - Reg Hanley (as James Callahan) Paul Hampton - Harry Sid Melton - Jerry Virginia Capers - Mama Holiday Yvonne Fair - Yvonne Isabel Sanford - The Madame Tracee Lyles - The Prostitute Ned Glass - The Agent Milton Selzer - The Doctor Norman Bartold - The Detective #1 Clay Tanner - The Detective #2 Jester Hairston - The Butler   I've been researching the life of Billie Holiday (1915-1959) recently and on a recent trip to the library I discovered they had the DVD of the 1972 biopic starring Diana Ross. I've never seen the film, and while I don't recommend watching movies as research,  I thought it might be interesting to see how they ...