You won't be familiar with every one of the huge array of women featured in this book, but all, familiar or not, leave unanswered questions behind them. The range is extensive, as was the research, with its insight into the lives and minds of women in different centuries and different countries, with diverse cultures and backgrounds, from the poverty-stricken to royalty. Mistresses, murderers, smugglers, pirates, prostitutes, and fanatics with hearts and souls that feature every shade of black (and grey!).

From Cleopatra to Ruth Ellis, from Boudicca to Bonnie Parker, from Lady Caroline Lamb to Moll Cutpurse, from Jezebel to Ava Gardner. Less familiar names include Mary Jeffries, the Victorian brothel-keeper, Belle Starr, the American gambler and horse thief, La Voisin, the seventeenth-century Queen of all Witches in France, but these are random names to illustrate the variety of content in store for all those interested in women who defy law and order, for whatever reason. The risqué, the adventurous and the outrageous, the downright nasty and the downright desperate—all human (female!) life is here. From the lower strata of society to the aristocracy, class is not a common denominator.

Wicked? Misunderstood? Naïve? Foolish? Predatory? Manipulative? Or just out of their time? Listen and decide.