Lessons in Chemistry
ABOUT
THE BOOK
Chemist Elizabeth Zott is not your average woman. In fact, Elizabeth Zott would be the first to point out that there is no such thing. But it’s the early 1960s and her all-male team at Hastings Research Institute take a very unscientific view of equality. Except for one: Calvin Evans, the lonely, brilliant, Nobel-prize nominated grudge-holder who falls in love with – of all things – her mind. True chemistry results. Like science, life is unpredictable. Which is why a few years later, Elizabeth Zott finds herself not only a single mother, but the reluctant star of America’s most beloved cooking show, Supper at Six. Elizabeth’s unusual approach to cooking (‘combine one tablespoon acetic acid with a pinch of sodium chloride’) proves revolutionary. But as her following grows, not everyone is happy. Because as it turns out, Elizabeth Zott isn’t just teaching women to cook. She’s daring them to change the status quo.
NOMINATING LIBRARY COMMENTS
Author Bonnie Garmus provides an original storyline that is refreshing, humorous, and very timely. Based in the 1950s and 1960s, the narrator is a smart, witty female working in a male dominated field that places women at a disadvantage. Unexpectedly she lands a cooking show called Supper at Six which becomes a platform for conveying a deeper message of perseverance and gender equality.
-Miami-Dade Public Library
Nothing about Elizabeth is conventional and this definitely isn’t a nostalgic look back at the 1950s by any stretch of the imagination! This is a brilliant story – of a woman who is determined to make her mark on the world and not willing to let anyone get in her way. She’s feisty, heroic, and intelligent, and she unwittingly becomes the star of a TV cookery show, aimed at teaching the nation how to make food that matters. The show becomes a call to arms to the millions of women who follow her ‘lessons in chemistry’ encouraging all to ‘use the laws of chemistry and change the status quo.’
The relationships throughout this book are so well drawn. We hope – like us – you’ll enjoy every minute of the book and immediately want to tell everyone you know to read it too!
-Norfolk Library and Information Service
Great story of women empowerment set in the 1960’s.
– Laramie County Library System