The Counselors: Conversations with 18 Courageous Women Who Have Changed the World.

Elizabeth Vrato Running Press www.runningpress.com 220pp., $24.95

Author Elizabeth Vrato took great pains to deliver a factually correct and articulate history of 18 women in legal and corporate professions--and did so with great attention to detail. There is no doubt that she assumed an enormous undertaking, amassing an abundance of facts, compiling them carefully, and paying close attention to historical accuracy. The result is a detailed history of the lives of 18 women, including Janet Reno, Sandra Day O'Connor, and Ruth Bader Ginsburg.

The book's rapid pace, however, and the vignettes that precede each biography, are disrupting and leave readers no opportunity to digest the wealth of material presented. In fact, The Counselors is so disjointed that the message the author labors so hard to relate--the importance of mentoring--is almost lost.

Fortunately, there is a secondary theme: strength of character and will to succeed, which drove many of the women Vrato profiled to the pinnacle of success.

Take, for example, Joyce Kennard. This California Supreme Court justice spent her early childhood in an internment camp during World War II and lived in a Quonset hut in a racially segregated area of New Guinea until age 13. She had little opportunity for formal education until her 20s, when she attended college and law school in the United States. Kennard also eventually earned a degree in public administration.

Her drive and dedication to pursuing her goals were sparked by her mother's persistence in trying to obtain an education for her daughter. It was only after her mother's death that Kennard pursued higher education. Her later successes were purely her own and stand as a monument to personal achievement.

Readers should have no trouble relating many of the subjects' experiences to the problems women in the legal and corporate worlds face today. Vrato notes that although glass ceilings may not be as evident today as they once were, they are clearly present. Many of the biographies speak of the need to break through barriers and poignantly depict stories of their successful destruction.

For instance, the brave independence of Maureen Kempston Darkes, president and general manager of General Motors Canada, Ltd., and vice president of General Motors Corp., may motivate many women. Darkes did not simply break through the glass ceiling; she crashed through every barrier with dogged determination.

The courage of many women in the legal profession is a message that springs from the pages. It could not have done so but for Vrato's hard work and dedication. Although The Counselors is a difficult read, the merit of its stories makes the book worthwhile.

Valerie Szabo is a sole practitioner in McLean, Virginia.