Cavallo Francesca - Good night stories for rebel girls: 100 tales of extraordinary women

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Particular Books is part of the Penguin Random House group of companies whose addresses can be found at global.penguinrandomhouse.com.

First published in the United States of America by Timbuktu Labs, Inc. 2016

First published in Great Britain by Particular Books 2017

Copyright Timbuktu Labs, Inc., 2016

The moral rights of the authors have been asserted

This is a work of creative nonfiction. It is a collection of heartwarming and thought-provoking bedtime stories inspired by the life and adventures of one hundred heroic women. It is not an encyclopedic account of events and accomplishments of their lives.

Editorial Direction & Art Direction by Francesca Cavallo and Elena Favilli

ISBN: 978-0-141-98601-2

There are many reasons why this book will always be special to us. Some are obvious: the record-breaking amount of money we raised through crowdfunding (more than one million dollars! Good Night Stories for Rebel Girls is the most funded original book in the history of crowdfunding), the astonishing number of backers from more than seventy countries, and the privilege of working with dozens of unbelievably talented female artists from all over the world.

Some reasons, though, are less obvious: the messages of soon-to-be moms and dads who told us that this is the first book they have bought for their daughters. The friend of a friend who said that this campaign gave her the confidence to start working on a project close to her heart that she had kept on hold for a long time because what if I fail? The email from a mom ecstatic to have a book that could help her share her perspective on the world with her three sons, not only as a mother, but as a woman. Above all, the deep trust that our backers have put in us.

This amount of trust is not something women get to experience very often. We do not take it for granted. How could we? Most of the extraordinary women featured in this book never experienced this kind of trust. No matter the importance of their discoveries, the audacity of their adventures, the width of their geniusthey were constantly belittled, forgotten, in some cases almost erased from history.

It is important that girls understand the obstacles that lie in front of them. It is just as important that they know these obstacles are not insurmountable. That not only can they find a way to overcome them, but that they can remove those obstacles for those who will come after them, just like these great women did.

Each of the hundred stories in this book proves the world-changing power of a trusting heart.

May these brave pioneers inspire you. May their portraits impress upon our daughters the solid belief that beauty manifests itself in all shapes and colors, and at all ages. May each reader know the greatest success is to live a life full of passion, curiosity, and generosity. May we all remember every day that we have the right to be happy and to explore wildly.

Now that youre holding this book, all we can feel is hope and enthusiasm for the world were building together. A world where gender will not define how big you can dream, how far you can go. A world where each of us will be able to say with confidence: I am free.

Thank you for being part of this journey.

Elena Favilli

Francesca Cavallo

Once upon a time, there was a girl named Ada who loved machines.

She also loved the idea of flying.

She studied birds to work out the perfect balance between wing size and body weight. She tested out materials and tried out several designs. She never managed to soar like a bird, but she created a beautiful book full of drawings called Flyology where she recorded all of her findings.

One night, Ada went to a ball. There, she met a grumpy old mathematician named Charles Babbage. Ada was a brilliant mathematician herself, and the two soon became good friends. Charles invited Ada to see a machine he had invented. He called it the Difference Engine. It could automatically add and subtract numbers. No one had ever done that before.

Ada was hooked.

What if we built a machine that could make more complicated calculations? she said. Excited, Ada and Charles started working. The machine was huge and it required an enormous steam engine.

Ada wanted to go further: What if this machine could play music and show letters as well as numbers?

She was describing a computer, way before modern computers were invented!

Ada wrote the first computer program in history.

DECEMBER 10, 1815NOVEMBER 27, 1852

UNITED KINGDOM

Once upon a time, there was a girl named Alek who would stop by a mango tree to get a snack on her way home from school.

In Aleks village, there was no running water nor electricity. She had to walk to a well for drinking water, but she and her family lived a simple and happy life.

Then, a terrible war broke out and Aleks life changed forever. As the warning sirens wailed over their village, Alek and her family had to run away from the fighting.

It was the rainy season. The river had flooded, the bridges across it were underwater, and Alek could not swim. She was terrified of drowning, but her mom helped her to cross safely to the other side. Along the way, Aleks mom traded packets of salt for food and passports because they didnt have any money. They managed to escape from the war, and made their way to London.

One day, she was in a park when a talent scout from a famous modeling agency approached her. He wanted to recruit Alek as a model. Aleks mother did not want to hear about it. But the agent persisted, and she finally agreed.

Alek looked so different from any other model, that she instantly became a sensation.

Alek wants every girl on the planet to know, You are beautiful. Its okay to be quirky, its fine to be shy. You dont have to go with the crowd.

BORN APRIL 16, 1977

SUDAN

Once there was a girl who could ride a bike so fast that you could barely see her. Dont go so fast, Alfonsina! her parents would scream. Too lateshe had already whizzed past.

When she got married, her family hoped that she would finally give up this crazy idea of becoming a cyclist. Instead, on her wedding day, her husband gifted her a brand-new racing bike. They moved to Milan, and Alfonsina started to train professionally.

She was so fast and so strong that a few years later, she entered the Giro dItalia, one of the toughest races in the world. No other woman had ever attempted it before. Shell never make it, people said. But nobody could stop Alfonsina.