By Joanne Wilke

University of Nebraska Press / A Bison Original
ISBN-13  978-0-8032-6019-1
$18.95 Original Trade Paperback
American History / Women’s Studies / Travel

MBA Bookseller Information
Available now. Order through the U of Nebraska Press, Trim Associates, or wholesalers. MBA Booksellers – earn up to $75 in rebates for promoting this book! See the marketing information and rebate form below.

A number of MBA bookstores have been sent reading copies of EIGHT WOMEN, TWO MODEL Ts, AND THE AMERICAN WEST, courtesy of the University of Nebraska Press.  MBA and the publisher would love to have your comments, reviews, and praise for this fascinating book.  Please send them to us so we can share your endorsements with your fellow MBA booksellers and with your customers!

EIGHT WOMEN is a great choice for reading groups interested in women’s history.  (See the READER’S GUIDE below!)  It also will intrigue younger readers, who will savor this glimpse into their great-grandparents’ generation.  Anyone who likes LITTLE HEATHENS will enjoy reading about these eight intrepid young women and their cross-country road trip!

Author Joanne Wilke is available to do phone-ins to your store’s book clubs, reading groups, or other groups in your town or city, such as a retirement community or a college or high school class. If you would like to set up a phone conference call, please contact Ms. Wilke directly.

Downloads

• Midwest Connections Marketing Info & Rebate Form (PDF)
• Full-Color Sign/Flyer (PDF)
• Reading Group Discussion Guide (PDF)
• Q&A with Author Joanne Wilke (PDF)
• Book Photo (JPG)
• Midwest Connections Generic Display Materials

About the Book

“This is a beautifully told story of adventure, and also a story of eight young women from Iowa who not only drew upon the resourcefulness of their brave immigrant ancestors to embark upon a remarkable journey, but lived the rest of their lives with a zest they passed on to children and grandchildren.”
- Mary Clearman Blew, author of All but the Waltz and Balsamroot

“Entertaining and inspiring.”
- Booklist

“Beautiful, filled with sharp, sensory details…. The letters the women sent home are a highlight of the book, brimming with the sort of pep and optimism that seems to be a hallmark of young people during this period of American history…The tale [Wilke] tells in Eight Women remains compelling throughout.”
- Jenny Shank, NewWest.net

“These eight travelers left a legacy of adventure that still resonates with their children and grandchildren and, thanks to Wilke’s book, is bound to inspire a new generation.”
- Lively Times

“Compellingly conveys the passion and determination that led these brave young travelers to ‘see some things’ together…. Throughout the book, Wilke expertly interweaves her own story of personal discovery and connection to the West…The result is a seamless fusion of memoir and adventure, insight and history.”
- Outside Bozeman

“As she follows clues in diaries and letters, tracing a daring Western journey by eight women in two Model T Fords, Joanne Wilke also finds wisdom that helps guide her own way through life.”
- Linda M. Hasselstrom, author of Between Grass and Sky and ten other books of Western nonfiction and poetry

“Wilke pays homage to family, to history, and to the lifelong pull of a compelling story. She manages it with integrity and writes with spare grace and lyricism.”
- Alan Kesselheim, author of Threading the Currents: A Paddler’s Passion for Water

In 1924 eight young women drove across the American West in two Model T Fords. In nine weeks they traveled more than nine thousand unpaved miles on an extended car-camping trip through six national parks, “without a man or a gun along.” It was the era of the flapper, but this book tells the story of a group of farm girls who met while attending Iowa’s Teacher’s College and who shared a “yen to see some things.”

A blend of oral and written history, adventure, memoir, and just plain heartfelt living, EIGHT WOMEN, TWO MODEL Ts, AND THE AMERICAN WEST is a story of ordinary people doing extraordinary things. Weaving together a granddaughter’s essays with family stories and anecdotes from the 1924 trip, the book portrays four generations of women extending from nineteenth-century Norway to present-day Iowa—and sets them loose across the western United States where the perils and practicalities of automotive travel reaffirm family connections while also celebrating individual freedom.

Joanne Wilke’s work has appeared in the Crazy Woman Creek: Women Rewrite the American West and Leaning into the Wind: Women Write from the Heart of the West anthologies. She has also written pieces for the Montana Quarterly, the Pacific Review, and the Christian Science Monitor.