An interesting history book, focusing mostly on European female rulers/leaders, beginning with Boadicea, a Celt, and ending with Margaret Thatcher. The overall affect of the book is kind of depressing in light of the repeated misogyny of these women, misogyny that still goes on today.

I thought the book would have been more readable and more enjoyable if Fraser hadn't been so adamant about so explicitly linking all of the women with their predecessors. The constant references to the past do work to show a pattern of behavior and ideas, but it also makes the book too repetitive in places. ( )

Another lovely work by Antonia Fraser. This time she looks at rulers beyond Europe, though the Americas are still sadly underrepresented... I wonder if this is due to interest or historical fact.

This was a particularly interesting read as Hillary Clinton was in the midst of running for President here in the U.S. -- it was very insightful to see that many complaints against Clinton (such as her "shrill" voice) were complaints leveraged among female leaders throughout history.

A timely, beautiful read. Can't recommend it enough. ( )

Fraser examines an interesting list of women down through the ages who have led their nations especially but not always in time of war. She refers to stereotypical roles such as the "appendage" model or the "voracity" model to seek to explain how the subject under examination was or wasn't successful in leading their subjects. She refers to the male dominated age in which we live and also to a pre-historic age in which matriarchal societies were the norm. Occasionally the narrative is marred by sentences interrupted by asides which would be better footnoted. ( )

interesting but somewhat light in the information, a good place to start from to if you want to do some research on warrior queens in history and the influence that Boudicia had on them and on the interpretation of them in the history books.
If you want more information look elsewhere and it left me wanting more. ( )