Quaker women in the eighteenth century were carrying on the faith and activity of their seventeenth-century forebears, but as a group their lives and writings have been neglected in modern times by both Quaker and other historians. Gil Skidmore has written an introduction to the lives and times, bringing together a rich array of letters, spiritual autobiographies, journals and memoirs. In her introduction, she puts the lives and concerns of these women into context and gives detailed biographies of each author. She shows the links that existed between them personally and the diffeences int heir thought, expression and experience. In broader terms, she illustrates how the writings of these women are relevant to the development of Quakerism up to the present. Gil Skidmore has chosen eight outstanding women whose writings she thinks are particularly poignant as well as relevant today: Grace Hall Chamber, Lydia Rawlinson Lancaster, Ruth Alcock Follows, Catheirne Payton Phillips, Sarah Tuke Grubb, Priscilla Hannah Gurney, Mary Alexander and Ann Crowley.