Praise for Val Wood

A heart-warming story filled with compelling action

Hull's answer to Catherine Cookson

With fully developed characters and a compelling story, it's no wonder the author won the Catherine Cookson Prize for Fiction for her debut... A great choice for a book club

'Emma Hornby writes strong, working-class women with heart and humour. The book is an absolute joy'

'I loved the twists and turns. The emotional pull on my heartstrings was exquisite. Emma Hornby is a natural storyteller who always delivers and, from the first words to the last, my attention was captured. Read this story at your leisure, read it on the bus or on the train, in your lounge or in your bed - but you must read it. Storytelling at its best'

'Edge of your seat drama, a book not to be missed!'

'A moving picture of an abused mother's love for her family, beautifully written and enthralling from the very first word'

Well-researched and enlightening

Unapologetically revisionist

In this astounding, generous book, Katy Hessel has given us such a gift. Her research is profound, scholarly and wide-ranging, her writing authoritative yet accessible. I found so much to surprise and delight in these pages, so many works of art pulsating with life and intelligence, beauty and power. This book is a long-overdue corrective, and Hessel has executed it to perfection, echoing the passion and skill of the very artists she writes about. An astonishing achievement.

Via chronological chapters focusing on periods of change, Hessel leads the reader back through this story, reinstating the countless women whose contributions were missed.

Vital... has firmly cracked open the canon

A spirited, inspiring, brilliantly illustrated history of female artistic endeavour... The Story of Art Without
Men should be on the reading list of every A-level and university art history course and on the front table of every museum and gallery shop.

A magnificent read and a beautiful book

Exhilarating ... a dazzling array marshalled by a talented young art historian who grinds her axe sharply and with skill ... [Hessel's] scholarship, enthusiasm and humour make this lavish book a must for any woman who loves art

An illuminating celebration of female artists and their often overlooked place in history

Passionate, enthusiastic and witty... I wish I had had this book as a teenager

A touchpoint for a new generation who will go on to define the future of those exhibitions, collections, and auctions

This eye-opening read is an overdue revisionist history of art - ignoring the pale, male canon to celebrate female artists who have been overlooked for centuries

The early centuries are thin simply due to the paucity of surviving work by talented women painters but her story becomes fuller and more persuasive the closer it gets to today. Hessel is clear-sighted and impartial enough not to over-claim for her subjects but show that they are full of interest and every bit as worthy of attention as their male peers.

Katy Hessel's first book The Story of Art without Men is a necessary and urgent book. A truly empowering title, the volume celebrates the rise of women artists and recentres them within art, political and social history. Many of these artists have been presented at Serpentine and their visions are getting the visibility they deserve through the fantastic visuals and Katy's thorough research

When women are literally written out of history, Hessel conveys how radical, powerful and vulnerable their lives and art were - and still are. Through moments of rage and celebration, this story fundamentally centres creative freedom: the stifling of it, and the lengths endured to claim it.

This passionate and personal telling of what has been an invisible history will bring revelation to anyone entering the world of art and its histories.

Although women have always made art, for far too long, art history has been told as the story of male achievement. Katy Hessel's The Story of Art without Men is a brilliantly readable and lively corrective. Outraged and celebratory, it's chock-full of female trail-blazers - from the Renaissance until the present day - who forged their way, despite facing the kind of hurdles that would stump most mortals

Compiled with zip and wit, even the informed reader will learn something new on every page - we really cannot recommend it enough

A sumptuously illustrated history... at once broad in scope and meticulously researched

This book has blown my mind. Really passionately recommend

An extraordinary eye-opener, and very readable ... we badly need books like Hessel's

Hessel's beautifully written 500-year survey is a welcome, necessary, addition to the bookshelves

Highly readable and lavishly illustrated... a rich storehouse of groundbreaking female art

Astonishing

This book changes everything. As soon as you open it, it's like you've opened a box of lit fireworks - out soars great artist after great artist. Her retake on the canon has changed it forever

Hessel possesses that rare quality of a public intellectual, whereby she can distill vast amounts of knowledge and history into something accessible, relevant and joyful

Extraordinary

Honest, wholesome entertainment

Utterly addictive

Exquisite writing and a story enriched by the power of abiding love

Full of romance, drama and snappy dialogue

Eminently readable and richly imagined

Hilarious and romantic. I couldn't put it down