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A Spanner in the Works: The extraordinary story of Alice Anderson and Australia’s first all-girl garage by Loretta Smith

by
January–February 2020, no. 418

A Spanner in the Works: The extraordinary story of Alice Anderson and Australia’s first all-girl garage by Loretta Smith

Hachette, $32.99 pb, 353 pp, 9780733642104

A Spanner in the Works: The extraordinary story of Alice Anderson and Australia’s first all-girl garage by Loretta Smith

by
January–February 2020, no. 418

On the evening of 6 August 1926, Alice Anderson donned her driving goggles and gloves, waved to the cheering crowds outside Melbourne’s Lyceum Club, and got into her tiny two-seater Austin 7. With her former teacher Jessie Webb beside her, the boot packed with two guns, sleeping bags, a compass, four gallons of water, a supply of biscuits, and, strangely, two potatoes with red curly wigs, she tooted the horn and set off. Her mission? A three-week pioneering trip to the never-never. ‘There is only one main route from Adelaide to Darwin, and that is only a camel track,’ the tiny young woman behind the wheel said breezily of the 2,607-kilometre journey ahead of her. ‘We are not going to stick to the beaten track.’

Sharon Verghis reviews 'A Spanner in the Works: The extraordinary story of Alice Anderson and Australia’s first all-girl garage' by Loretta Smith

A Spanner in the Works: The extraordinary story of Alice Anderson and Australia’s first all-girl garage

by Loretta Smith

Hachette, $32.99 pb, 353 pp, 9780733642104

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Comment (1)

  • A wonderfully enthralling read. Thank you so much.
    Posted by Jane Hayton
    27 September 2023