LESSONS IN CHEMISTRY By Bonnie Garmus

JACKET DESIGN AND ILLUSTRATION BY JIM TIERNEY

I try to approach each book I read without assumptions or expectations, but somehow I thought Lessons in Chemistry was a Romantic Comedy. Maybe I was led astray by Jim Tierney’s clever cover (that No. 2 pencil plays a key role) or the suggestive book title. But Lessons in Chemistry is NOT a Romantic Comedy. There’s only a smidgen of romance and some dabs of occasional comedy in this 390 page novel.

Elizabeth Zott is chemist working for Hastings Research Institute in 1952. As you might expect, she gets little respect although she’s the best chemist in the company. Bonnie Garmus then introduces an incident with Elizabeth and her thesis advisor at UCLA where the advisor attempts to rape her (p. 18) so we know a large portion of Lessons in Chemistry will involve sexual discrimination, male chauvinism, sleazy Fifties/Sixties conduct, and creepy sexist behavior. Most men in Lessons in Chemistry behave badly.

The turning point for Elizabeth happens when a local TV producer approaches her with the idea for a scientific cooking show to be called Supper at Six. Since the producer is offering more money than Elizabeth is making at the Hastings Research Institute, she dubiously takes the offer and surprisingly becomes a successful TV personality.

But Bonnie Garmus has further intentions. Elizabeth’s lover is a rower and introduces her to rowing (Garmus is a rower in Real Life, too). Both Elizabeth and her lover have murky pasts which Elizabeth’s precocious young daughter, Madeline, explores. And, as you would expect, Elizabeth uses her unique cooking show to advance feminism.

So, although I started reading Lessons in Chemistry with false expectations of romance and comedy, I got a lesson in chemistry, female empowerment, food preparation, and child rearing. GRADE: B

16 thoughts on “LESSONS IN CHEMISTRY By Bonnie Garmus

  1. Steve+A+Oerkfitz

    Saw this at B&N but ignored it as it was displayed with a table of books with pastel colors. Usually such books are not targeted at me.

    Reply
  2. Byron

    I read the blurb on the dust jacket and the book is very much marketed as a frothy quasi-romantic read-something very much reinforced by the rom-com cover art. This is a deliberate publisher reaction to the Tik Tokification of the book industry and the waves of young women pouring into Barnes & Noble every week to pick up an armful of books and snap a selfie of themselves at the cash register (this is very much a thing). I wouldn’t be surprised to see more and more books misrepresented this way. The premise of a woman chemist turned Julia Childs meets America’s Test Kitchen sounds just…ugh.

    Reply
    1. george Post author

      Byron, I confess I fell for the whole Rom-Com vibe surrounding LESSONS IN CHEMISTRY. So the frothy quasi-romantic aura around this book is sure selling it.

      Reply
  3. patti abbott

    The reviews I have read have been pretty positive and none indicated a romance. They talked a lot about its humor. I have it on hold at the library.

    Reply
  4. maggie+mason

    the title would scare me off. I’m not good in math or science, which is why I couldn’t be a nurse, couldn’t pass chemistry.

    Interesting comment about the color of books for marketing, very true. I’d never thought of that before

    Reply
    1. Todd Mason

      The default resistance of particularly women readers (not all, but too many) to anything with a scientific theme about it might well help explain the “chick-lit” packaging…along with other sad, blithe stereotyping and/or canny marketing ploys.

      As someone who has paddled a canoe a bit (not a double-entendre) and likes rowing machines as well as feminist as well as other underdogs who make good against expectations, I suspect I’d enjoy the narrative.

      Reply

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