Aloha Wanderwell Takes the Wheel

In the 1920s and 1930s, Aloha Wanderwell drove Model Ts across five continents, winning fame as the most traveled woman in the world.

Sixteen-year-old Idris Hall ran away from her boarding achool in 1924, changed her name, and joined the daring around-the-world expedition of charismatic Walter "Cap" Wanderwell, beginning a decade-long adventure that would take her across five continents behind the wheel of a Model T, in an era where roads were often no more than grooves in the dirt, and few if any people had seen a car or a European face.

Who was Aloha Wanderwell? How did she find the determination and courage to survive threats like stampeding elephants in Africa, a blizzard obliterating the road in Ukraine, and armed militants in China? Who was Walter Wanderwell? Rogue, philanderer, con man, and perhaps a German spy-he was all of this, as well as the love of Aloha's life. Through the grit of their travel and the giddy heights of their international fame, Aloha grows from a starstruck teen to a woman confident of everything except the man who cannot love her the way she needs.

Aloha Wanderwell Takes the Wheel is a richly imagined exploration of Aloha's inner and outer world, told against the backdrop of one of the great adventure stories of its time, and the murder that brought it to a catastrophic end.