Cathryn Prince is a journalist and award-winning author of historical nonfiction—her most recent work, Queen of the Mountaineers: The Trailblazing Life of Fanny Bullock Workman, will be released on May 7th. This biography explores the life and adventures of the pioneering Fanny Bullock Workman, a woman whose ambition, passion, and determination changed the face of mountain exploration. Stephanie Cheslock has been a beta-reader for Swenson Book Development LLC the past year and this is her first blog post. She interviewed Cathryn Prince after reading an Advance Review Copy of Queen of the Mountaineers. Stephanie Cheslock: Fanny Bullock Workman, the pioneering woman mountain climber, is a fairly obscure topic. How did you discover her and decide to write her biography? Cathryn Prince: I wanted to write about a woman who was a pioneer in her field, who defied social conventions, whose story had been lost to history, and who had a story that would resonate today. So when I stumbled on Workman’s story I was delighted. The more I read, the more intrigued I grew. So many facets of her life resonate today:  her personal ambition, her decision to have children and how that fit into her pursuit of her passion (which she turned into a career), the way her rivalry with another female American mountain climber played out in the media. So many of the issues Workman faced are issues women wrestle with today: including the way strong, ambitious women are judged differently than men. Ultimately Workman wanted to be…

I’m pleased to announce Cathryn J. Prince, author of For the Love of Labor: The Life of Pauline Newman, secured an offer on her exclusive submission to Alison Syring, again, at University of Illinois Press for a book about the life and death of Barbara Robbins, the CIA’s first female officer killed in the line of duty and first American female killed in Vietnam during the 1965 Embassy bombing in Saigon, and how it pulled America deeper into the conflict in Southeast Asia. A Bombing in Saigon will be released in 2029. This is the story of a 21-year-old who joined the CIA fresh out of college, feeling duty-bound to serve her country and imbued with a sense of invincibility and optimism. And it is also about how Robbins’ story reflects the mood of the nation—still optimistic and confident as the politicians kept striding forward into the Vietnam War, in spite of the growing disillusionment nipping at its heels. Barbara Robbins was born in 1943 in South Dakota while her father was off fighting in the Pacific. Although she was badly injured in a car accident when she was three, her parents resisted the temptation to hover. Instead they nurtured her curiosity and watched her grow into an energetic and bold young woman. After graduating high school, Robbins matriculated at Colorado State University to study French. Then, when the CIA came calling—at a time when most Americans would be hard pressed to find Vietnam on a map—Robbins, an ordinary citizen…

Author of Queen of the Mountaineers and American Daredevil, Cathryn J. Prince has signed a publishing contract for her next book, For the Love of Labor: The Pioneering Life of Pauline Newman, with University Press of Kentucky for a 2024 release. Before Greta Thunberg, Emma Gonzalez, or Malala Yousafzai, there was Pauline Newman. She had been union organizing since the age of 16 before the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory killed her comrades. She had arrived in the tenements of the Lower Eastside with her recently widowed mother and younger siblings from Lithuania working in the garment district at the age of 11. The first female organizer of one of America’s most powerful unions, the International Ladies Garment Workers Union, she led strikes and carried on the fight to end child labor. She spent eight days in the White House conferring with Francis Perkins, President Roosevelt and others for the New Deal. Part of the Eleanor Roosevelt’s circle of women who spent time at her cottage Val-Kill, Pauline Newman and her partner, Frieda Miller, lived together for more than a half-century, raising a daughter and doting on her two grandsons. For the Labor of Love: The Pioneering Life of Pauline Newman is the first full-scale biography to illustrate how a teen activist spent a lifetime pursuing social justice. Cathryn J. Prince is an author of six previous books, a free-lance journalist, and a journalism educator at Fordham University and SUNY-Purchase. She holds an M.S. in journalism from Columbia University, a B.A. in…