Eighty Days: Nellie Bly and Elizabeth Bisland's History-Making Race Around the World
by Matthew Goodman
Eighty Days, an Amazing Race of the Victorian Era (1/2/2013)
Eighty Days the new nonfiction book by Matthew Goodman gives readers an understanding of what life was like for the career woman as the impact of the industrial revolution began to take hold and shrink the Victorian world. Nelie Bly and Elizabeth Bisland, two women of different backgrounds, social class and degrees of backing from their respective editors raced in opposite directions around the globe to prove it could be done in less than the eighty days prescribed by Jules Verne. Much of Goodman's Eighty Days reads like a novel and the accounts are fascinating. Readers can't help but cheer for their favorite much as the readers of their day must have done.
While the depth of research done by Goodman is extensive, such level of detail tends to bog down the narrative. Forty pages of notes and bibliography may attest to the veracity of the text it appeals mostly to the historians that would applaud that level of detail. When Goodman is focused on the narrative the story is more compelling.
Overall, the book is a good read and can afford book clubs threads of discussions on: the treatment of women in professions, particularly journalism, then and now, the beginnings of globalization, and the joys, discoveries and frustrations of travel.
