Lessons in Chemistry A Novel

This book was recommended to me by a colleague and while I heard snippets about it and saw a short preview of the show I had no expectations. Story really drew me in right away. I loved how all the characters were intertwined with each other and how bad ass Elizabeth Zott was. I also appreciated how she raised her daughter. Calvin’s equally complex background and untimely death was sad but I appreciated how all his mysteries were solved including why Elizabeth never dated again. Normally I don’t like stories from past decades but this one really depicted a lot of deep messages really well and I also found myself on multiple occasions laughing out loud because it was so absurd yet pretty accurate. Plus listening to all the chemistry explanations was really entertaining.Loved it!

This is a beautiful love story but more importantly a reminder to women to stand up for themselves in what is still a male dominated world. The theft of women’s work by men claiming it to be their own is no surprise. I wish there was a tv series like in the book, where a woman explained the chemistry of cooking. There was a show that did that, but alas, it featured a man, and the women in the show were seen as annoying.

I read this so long ago that if Amazon hadn’t marked it read, I would not have checked it out. Evidently things have not changed as much as I thought from one female parent/child household in the 1950’s to now, as I see Elizabeth and Mad would most likely be isolated and labelled autistic. No one bothered to determine whether or not she was or had been married to determine any rights or care necessary for the two, but now there would be great concern for father parental rights which would be a large social prybar into their business, allowing the bullying to begin, after all, it sounds much more progressive than gossip, nosiness, and social climbing or jealousy. However, armor society fears most: drop dead beauty powered by nuclear level intelligence which link seamlessly and feed each other symbiotically will frustrate and confuse most such social efforts and will allow the growth of a different and richer fact pattern which will save their world or destroy it. I’m opting for the positive outcome myself. I met some people like this mother and child once,and while the daughter thought (wrongly) she could save the world when she grew up, the mother thought she could save her child. She was right and every day I thank her for it, bcs that is all one can do, really, and it is hard enough that very very few women besides Elizabeth and Dee will succeed. Bonnie is right and her beautiful words do work. Enjoy them, as she would be first to say they are just good practical applied science. Oh yes. And love. Read. Maybe , just maybe we can help them save the world!! Wouldn’t it be fun? Www

Such a fun ride. Great dialogue and the characters believable and interesting. I want sure I’d enjoy it at first, but the story grabs you and won’t let go. Highly recommend.

I don’t know how it was that this book came into my hands at exactly the time it did. When its theme, about women and their treatment in the 1960s, about triumphing over it, about new beginnings, endings…. It spoke to me SO strongly. It’s funny, sad, I was crying for the last 30 pages but they were tears of release. This book meant so much to me. And the strangest thing was that, this week I was talking to a cousin who is going through some health issues because she’s a woman and I mentioned I was reading this book. She said, “Oh I have it right beside me, I’ve read it twice! I loved it!” I bought a copy for my daughter, I hope she reads it and reads it deeply because it has a message for every woman (I say woman although who knows, maybe men can “get” the message to) who has had to navigate our Western values and mores, especially these last 100 years.