Naomi Weisman is a Canadian, Australian and mother of three, who loves to ramble with her dog, cook for family and friends, and laugh whenever possible.
In Toronto, I searched online and in several bookstores for a book by Bonnie Garmus called Lessons in Chemistry before leaving on my trip to Australia, without any luck. I had heard it was a good read and thought it would be perfect for the long flight.
I even looked for it in the airport because airport bookstores usually have a great selection, but I still couldn't find it. So, I settled for my backup, a Ken Follett book that I found in a box on the sidewalk outside someone's house, marked "free."
I love historical fiction and enjoyed the Ken Follett book. However, I was still fixated on finding the book I wanted, so my bio-mom Helen and I began the quest in a small town in Victoria, Australia. We struck gold immediately, literally!
This quaint town and this lovely bookshop had just received their first shipment of the second printing that very day, and it would only cost $40! I've never paid that much for a book but was hoping that the book's reputation would hold true and justify the cost.
Set in the early 1960s, this story is centered around Elizabeth Zott, a natural-born chemist trying to make a career for herself in the male-dominated arena of academia. Roadblocks are set in her path at almost every turn, including some very dark and disturbing ones.
Faced with being a single parent, Zott discovers a way to make ends meet as a chemist in a traditionally female role, where she continually struggles with how she sees herself versus how others want her to be.
I have a mixed review for you today. I read in different ways depending on my mood and the circumstances I find myself in while reading. Sometimes I read a book too profoundly, and sometimes I read on a surface level.
The good news: Lessons in Chemistry is a page-turner and thoroughly enjoyable from this standpoint. Although the characters were mostly one-dimensional, they are engaging, especially the dog named Six-thirty. Bonnie Garmus' sense of humor is on full display throughout the book, with some laugh-out-loud moments.
The bad news is how much time I spent suspended in disbelief. I just didn't buy the feminist viewpoints of Zott, given the time period she was living in. It was as if she had been exposed to modern twenty-first-century feminist theory and then applied it to her 1960s life.
So, was this book worth the effort to find and pay that hefty price? Once I surrendered to the idea of believing the characters and allowing myself to enjoy the story, I was able to give this book a thumbs up for the pure enjoyment of the humor.
I left my golden copy of Lessons in Chemistry in Australia for Helen to read and then to pass on to as many people as possible to make the cost of the book per person as low as possible.
READ MORE > Nomi's Pics, Rambler Cafe Blog
I really enjoyed this book. I hadn’t really thought about the “ahead of it’s time feminist theory” so now you have me wanting to go back and read it again! I once met a fascinating woman in her 70’s in a course that I took and she told me how she had been a scientist working on a very important experiment in a time when she was the only woman in the lab. She met her husband who was also a scientist, and once married she gave up her promising career to raise her children (as she said that is just what you did at the time) but she seemed very sad and unfulfilled by this decision years later and as though she were at a crossroads as to what to do with her remaining years. It was just a short exchange of life stories but it certainly made an impression on me and I have thought of her often. So this book really resonated with me after meeting this pioneering woman. I hope she found a renewed sense of purpose with her life. 💕
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