Four months after launching on Kickstarter, a children’s book that tells the stories of 100 inspiring women has raised more than $1m (£754,000), making it the biggest publishing project in the crowdfunding site’s history. Almost 20,000 backers from 71 countries around the world have signed up to order Rebel Girls, which introduces young readers to role models from the Brontë sisters to Serena Williams. The sums involved in the majority of Kickstarter’s publishing projects coming this autumn may be a little smaller, but the breadth and scope of the books is impressive: everything from a comic novel of small-town Canada from a Québec humor columnist and broadcaster, to an account of looking after a rescued Staffordshire bull terrier, charting the dog’s journey from troubled crackpot to treasured companion, to a graphic novel about a Victorian girl who is the only one in her village to notice a series of sinister goings-on.