Polio was as dreaded as the atomic bomb in America in the 1940s and ’50s. Many who survived the disease faced lifelong crippling consequences. The best scientific minds in the world were engaged in the race to find a vaccine. The pioneering work of Dr. Jonas Salk would have never happened without the brilliance and tenacity of the woman with the cure.

“The Woman with the Cure,” by Lynn Cullen, is a historical novel about Dr. Dorothy Horstmann. Cullen will be the Georgia Writer’s Museum July “Meet the Author” presenter July 16at the Plaza Arts Center, at 7p.m. (doors open at 6:30).

Tickets are $40.

Register and pre-order copies of Cullen’s book at www.georgiawritersmuseum.org.

Horstmann was not focused on beating her colleagues to the vaccine. She just wanted the world to have a cure. She applied the same determination that lifted her from a humble background as the daughter of immigrants to becoming a doctor, often the only woman in the room. She was the first woman appointed as a Yale School of Medicine professor. Her most notable contribution was her demonstration that the polio virus reached the central nervous system via the bloodstream, upsetting conventional wisdom and paving the way for a polio vaccine.

The book opens in Nashville in 1941. Dr. Horstmann arrives as a new resident at Vanderbilt University, surprising the chief of medicine. On paper, her credentials read D.M. Horstmann. She knew she was working in a man’s profession and needed to do all she could to downplay her gender. The chief of medicine was unhappy about Dr. Horstmann being a woman but she did not care. With her quick wit, she signaled she was there to stay. Blending in was challenging at six feet one inch tall, making her tower over most men, but she was determined to hold her ground.

“Everyone knows Sabin and Salk created the polio vaccine,” wrote NY Times bestselling author Bonnie Garmus, author of Lessons in Chemistry. “But without the work of Dr. Dorothy Horstmann, there never would have been a vaccine in the first place.”

Cullen is the bestselling author of historical novels, “The Sisters of Summit Avenue,”“Twain‘s End,”“Mrs. Poe,”“Reign of Madness” and “I Am Rembrandt’s Daughter.” Her novel, “Mrs. Poe,” was named a People Magazine Book of the Week, and an Oprah Book of the Week, plus Atlanta Magazine named it one of the Best Books of 2013. Twain’s End was a Townsend Prize finalist and named a “Book All Georgians Should Read” by the Georgia Center for the Book. Lynn’s novels have been translated into seventeen languages, and she has appeared on PBS’s American Masters. She lives in Atlanta.