Snow Widows by Katherine MacInnis

Katherine MacInnes’ fascinating historical biography is based on unprecedented

access to family archives. Her account of the lives of five extraordinary women:

Kathleen Scott, who campaigned relentlessly for Scott’s reputation; Oriana Wilson

who understood more than most what the men faced in Antarctica and ‘Empire’;

Emily Bowers, who had already survived the burning of Perak in the third Anglo-

Burmese war; the indomitable Caroline Oates, who openly snubbed the King’s

invitations to celebrate the expedition; and Lois Evans, who was forced to endure the

media’s assertions that her husband, the sole ‘Jack Tar’ (sailor) in a band of officers,

must have been responsible for the party’s downfall.

Snow Widows is a gripping and remarkable feat of historical reconstruction, where

MacInnes vividly depicts the lives, loves and losses of five women who were each

shaped by the unrelenting culture of Empire and forced into the public eye by

tragedy. It also reveals the five heroes, not as the caricatures of legend, but as the

real people they were.

Katherine MacInnes is both an author and an artist. Snow Widows was shortlisted

for the Biographers’ Prize. Katherine is a member of the Society of Authors and the

Biographers’ Club and has studied drawing under artist and print maker Dr Wendy

Rhodes. Katherine is herself a keen climber and adventurer and through her own

experience may relate in part to those of the women she has written about.