Yankee Girl A Grand Adventure by JoAn Martin

Wanda works at her father's tavern all day and half the night to keep up with customers and clean up after closing.  Her father drinks and isn't much help at all.  Now the men are starting to eyeball her and offer suggestions about meeting after the tavern closes.  She has no interest in that, but they aren't willing to take no for an answer.

Ms. Martin sent me a copy of her book for review (thank you).  To order contact:

LLibrary Integrated Solutions
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When a bar customer tries to attack her, Wanda knows she has to leave.  When she hears two young men talk about joining the Army, she decides that's her best bet.  She cuts her hair, puts on boy's clothes, and heads out to meet up with them and continue on to enlist.  She uses her middle name, Wayne, and goes to battle with the men.  

While hiding your sexuality is a bit incredulous and unbelieveable, there was more than one woman who did so successfully during the Civil War.  Bathing was uncommon, they slept with their clothes on, and as long as you kept up and did what you were ordered to do, there was no reason to suspect otherwise.

I had hopes of a happy ending and didn't really get one, but life doesn't always happen that way.  Wanda (Wayne) survives the war.  And it looks like she's going on the road again.  

This is written for young adults and you may want to find them some nonfiction to read about the women soldiers in the civil war.  They were as tough or tougher than the men they fought with.  And they continued as strong women after the war.  It was a fascinating time in our history.

Happy reading.