Starry and Restless

The page-turning story of three women reporters and the way they changed the world, work, and journalism.

Rebecca West, Emily “Mickey” Hahn, Martha Gellhorn. Congo, the American South, Cuba, the lively salons of Shanghai, Yugoslavia on the brink of World War II, the shot-riddled streets of Spain, Hong Kong under Japanese occupation, Germany and Italy at war, post-Blitz London, McCarthy-era Mexico, and beyond. These women didn’t just bear witness to the great changes of the twentieth century, they didn’t just write the backstory to wars that roused their readers to support, they transformed the very world they were describing, and the way it was understood.

Each writer traversed the globe, searching for stories they would then dispatch to The New Yorker, The Times (London), The New York Times, The New Republic, The Atlantic Monthly, Collier’s, and Vogue. They often traveled alone, sometimes teaming up with other women reporters, sometimes with their husbands along for the ride. They sneaked onto the front lines when they were forbidden, interviewed civilians to gather color and detail. They wrote novels to pay the bills and articles to explain the world to itself. Over the course of their intertwining lives, they became mothers and friends, took joy in each other’s successes.

Julia Cooke’s Starry and Restless is the story of three women whose curiosity, grit, and ambition expanded the possibilities for women and meaningful work.