FLASH!! - The Hunderdth
Woman is one
of two Finalists in Visionary
Fiction for the Independant
Publishers Book Awards
2004!!
The
Hundredth Woman
is a humorous, page-turning,
gabby girlfriend adventure
story. It also manages
to tuck into its pages
much of the wisdom I have
acquired over a lifetime
of learning from two important
sources.
I’ve
traveled five continents
to learn from indigenous
people,
whose wisdom comes in
to The Hundredth Woman
through the grandmother
of Clarissa, a mixed-blooded
Cherokee environmental
activist who is one of
the main characters.
The
main character, Morgan,
is Clarissa’s therapist.
She brings in the wisdom
I have gathered by going
within as native people
have taught me to do and
applying the wisdom I
find there to my work
with my clients, those
brave and big-hearted
souls who have allowed
me to midwife them on
their paths to creating
the lives they want. I
loved presenting the three
fiery women who are the
heroes of The Hundredth
Woman because
they each have such different
ways of dealing with how
to reach the point where
they are living their
dreams by finding their
life paths.
What
in the Heck Does “The
Hundredth Woman”
Mean?
(The
following is an exert
from an interview with
Susan Meeker Lowry in
October, 2003.)
SML:
The title of your book
is The Hundredth Woman.
I’m assuming that
came from the hundredth
monkey theory?
KG:
That’s taken from
the phrase the hundredth
monkey that came out of
some experiments that
scientists were doing
with monkeys I believe
off the Japanese coast.
They were dropping off
crates of potatoes to
feed the monkeys and on
one of the islands a young
female monkey began washing
the dirt off the potatoes
before she would eat them.
And eventually the other
monkeys started doing
the same thing. By the
time about 100 monkeys
on that island were washing
potatoes, monkeys on the
other islands started
doing the same thing spontaneously
even though they had no
contact with the first
group of monkeys.
Since then that whole
experiment has been refuted
or questioned. However
it’s not controversial
is that there is a great
deal of evidence that
when a certain critical
but small number of individuals
in a species learn a behavior,
the rest of the species
automatically pick it
up. In fact there were
some birds in England
called the Blue Tit, I
think it was during the
30’s who started
pecking the lids off milk
bottles that were delivered
on doorsteps and they
would drink the cream
off the top. The Blue
Tits are homebodies and
don’t travel more
than 15 miles. In spite
of that fact it didn’t
take long for all the
Blue Tits throughout all
of England to begin doing
this. That couldn’t
be explained by contact
or by them flying. And
it started happening in
other countries as well.
And there are several
other instances, such
as rats used in maze experiments,
that demonstrate the same
thing. The reason why
that is used in the book
is because in the human
species we tend to do
the same thing and there’s
a lot of evidence it’s
already happening. In
the 60s when the women’s
movement started a lot
of things began that I
think indicate a growing
female influence. For
example the environmental
movement — basic
female thing, to clean
up the mess. Even though
that movement is famous
for having a very hierarchal
structure with too many
men with too much power
it’s still a woman’s
way of thinking. Women's’
rights have grown exponentially
since the 60s although
there’s a long way
to go. We’re on the
way we just need to keep
pushing that envelope.
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