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416 pages, Paperback
First published January 31, 2023
I really enjoyed learning about Captain Thurídur’s life and accomplishments. Most surprising, I think, was the sheer amount of primary source material that Margaret Willson had to work with. Apparently, Thurídur and others of her time left plenty of records so her life was more well documented than the lives of most humans in the 1700s and 1800s. Thurídur truly was a remarkable woman, not only for (successfully) captaining a fishing boat in the freezing seas off southwest Iceland, wearing trousers (!), or guiding travelers through perilous snowstorms in her advanced age, but for her compassion and empathy for those who had less than she did. I loved that she often sacrificed her own well being to help those less fortunate, including abused women, children with physical and/or mental disabilities, and paupers.