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  • The Queen of Whale Cay

  • The Extraordinary Story of ‘Joe’ Carstairs, the Fastest Woman on Water
  • By: Kate Summerscale
  • Narrated by: Lissa Berry
  • Length: 6 hrs and 26 mins
  • 4.4 out of 5 stars (8 ratings)
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The Queen of Whale Cay cover art

The Queen of Whale Cay

By: Kate Summerscale
Narrated by: Lissa Berry
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Summary

Bloomsbury presents The Queen of Whale Cay by Kate Summerscale, read by Lissa Berry.  

Born in 1900 to a promiscuous American oil heiress and a British army captain, Marion Barbara Carstairs realised very early on that she was not like most little girls.  

Liberated by war work in WWI, Marion reinvented herself as Joe and quickly went on to establish herself as a leading light of the fashionable lesbian demi-monde. She dressed in men's clothes, smoked cigars and cheroots, tattooed her arms, and became Britain's most celebrated female speedboat racer - the 'fastest woman on water'.     

Yet Joe tired of the limelight in 1934 and retired to the Bahamian Island of Whale Cay. There she fashioned her own self-sufficient kingdom, where she hosted riotous parties which boasted Hollywood actresses and British royalty among their guests. Although her lovers included screen sirens such as Marlene Dietrich, the real love of Joe's life was a small boy-doll named Lord Tod Wadley, to whom she remained devoted throughout her remarkable life. She died, aged 93, in 1993.
©1997 Kate Summerscale (P)2019 Bloomsbury Publishing Plc
Historical Women
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Critic reviews

"She was crazy and brave and her story is jaw-droppingly amazing...Great stuff." (Val Hennessy, Daily Mail)

"A wonderful account of a truly extraordinary life." (Mail on Sunday)

"A biography that sparkles with enthusiastic research and empathetic writing." (Sunday Times)

What listeners say about The Queen of Whale Cay

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The book was lovely to listen to, but I couldn’t see any way of looking at photographs when are used Audible. What a shame

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