Stories of Ingenious Inventions by Women - Girls Think of Everything

Bought for a 9yr old niece who is very interested in science. I love how it has the potential to teach female children that science and math are not 'boy things' and help them stay interested in these subjects. Sometimes you just need to be reminded that science is cool for girls too.

The cover illustration promised a whole lot more than was offered inside. The individual stories were factual and little else. Couldn't they have had more liveliness that would equal the cover? My search was for books about girls/women who make a difference in history and modern times, and this was accomplished but with little "pizzazz".

The cover illustration promised a whole lot more than was offered inside. The individual stories were factual and little else. Couldn't they have had more liveliness that would equal the cover? My search was for books about girls/women who make a difference in history and modern times, and this was accomplished but with little "pizzazz".

Nearly all of these inventions are related to women's outdated housewife role: new mops, disposable diapers, food preparations. Especially noticing the many inventions listed at the end of the book, I find this an insulting compendium that includes nearly no scientific advances. The cover is great but I WILL NOT BE GIVING THIS TO MY 8 YEAR OLD GRANDDAUGHTER! I am throwing it away.

I love a good anthology, particularly of the contributions of women in history. The point is not that men haven't done great things that we deserve learning about but that they aren't the only ones who have. Despite hardship and opposition, women have invented lots of things, some that we couldn't live without today and others that are so common, I didn't even realize that it used to be a problem.

This book takes just about an hour to listen to. It has some women I was already familiar with (like my hero, Admiral Grace Hopper) and others that were new (Margaret Knight invented the machine that makes paper grocery bags, they had to be made by hand and were expensive before that).

Wanted to buy a gift for a friend's daughter that would inspire her. The Girls Think of Everything book did just that. It included 12 stories and provided a great launching pad for conversation and inspiration. I found this was a gift that I have purchased a couple times over for my many nieces. Definitely recommend!

We love reading this with our daughter and son (he's 4 so doesn't get offended by the title yet;)
She finds it fascinating and loves to go invent her own things after reading. A great inspirational resource for any age!

I applaud the idea of this book and some of the stories are really inspiring, but its execution is not always thoughtful. It takes the air out of your tires when the first example of an "ingenious invention" by a woman is-- drum roll-- a kind of cookie! I mean, really? What kind of message does that send? Way to go women ---you're so AMAZING--you baked a yummy cookie? Not exactly challenging stereotypes, disappointing, not the book I was hoping for.

I read and reread this book as a little girl, and it inspired me to invent some devices of my own. None of the ones I came up with back then were much good (two-story bouncy house, anyone?) but it was good practice for more sophisticated ideas, and I learned a little about patents in the process. Girls Think Of Everything was, and still is, one of my absolute favorite books -- I owned several different books about inventions, and this was the best of the lot. The selected inventions are each fascinating and different, and there are plenty of explanations, diagrams, etc. for you to see how they work. I'm reviewing it now because I spotted it while looking at the store's back-to-school deals in preparation for college -- I'm starting at MIT this fall, and I can definitely pinpoint this book as a formative influence. (For kids fascinated by mechanisms, I also highly recommend 507 Mechanical Movements, which is Exactly What It Says On The Tin. Not really a conventional kids' book, but don't let that stop you.)

My copy is a hardcover, which is physically pretty much what you'd expect from a hardcover book for kids. It held up to my not-so-tender care rather well, even during a phase where I destroyed a lot of other books.

Bought this for my engineering-loving (4) niece. The book was too advanced for her, but I found my (7) nephew reading it cover-to-cover. He is a boy's-boy, in the "girls-are-yucky" phase of childhood, but he found the book to be a fascinating read about really cool inventors and engineering feats.

Very short descriptions of inventions. Chocolate chip cookies as an invention falls short of what we were expecting to find in this book. My daughter looked through it once, declared it 'boring' and hasn't picked it up since. This is a child who has read books with a great deal of factual content multiple times. Had I been able to look through the book prior to purchase, I wouldn't have bought it.

This book was the best book I have read so far on my summer reading book list. It was very interesting to me. It is the best subject to write a book on. I had the best time reading it. I think that people could have more confidence to invent something after reading this book, even men.

This book allowed me to share stories of inventions by women with my students. Girls often feel left out of the "science of invention", this book allows them to relate to accomplishments in a field where girls often don't relate to the material presented.

A wonderful accounting over an expanse of time of ingenious inventions by women. The unwritten backstory consist of inventions when women weren't allowed to hold patents and their husbands had to apply. Hence, many inventions true inventors have been subsumed in the patriarchy. Another part of the backstory comes from reading the types of inventions and realizing that very many of them were conceived to make domestic life more efficient since women were relegated to the domestic sphere. This is a great primer for all people and especially young women to impart some of the many ways women excelled in times of oppression.

Read your daughter something useful at night. As a father I have no interest in reading her stories about a princess in need of saving. This is a great book to teach her how awesome woman are. She very much enjoyed it and even reads it on her own at eight years old.

Nice book for educating little ones about women inventors. Its a great tool, would recommend to anyone who are unfamiliar with how much women contribute/contributed to the world with their ingenious inventions.

I got this book to give as a gift to a grandmother/engineer to share with her granddaughters. It has been reported that adults and children are both enjoying the book and the time spent together with the book.

This book was the best book I have read so far on my summer reading book list. It was very interesting to me. It is the best subject to write a book on. I had the best time reading it. I think that people could have more confidence to invent something after reading this book, even men.

This book allowed me to share stories of inventions by women with my students. Girls often feel left out of the "science of invention", this book allows them to relate to accomplishments in a field where girls often don't relate to the material presented.