Book review: Lessons in Chemistry by Bonnie Garmus

LESSONS IN CHEMISTRY by Bonnie Garmus. Penguin Books.

This delightful book is actually a fierce feminist manifesto masquerading as a heartwarming domestic life story. The basketful of prizes it has won – Best Debut Fiction of 2022, Goodreads Choice Best Debut Novel Award, NYT No 1 bestseller, Book of the Year for The Times, Sunday Times, Guardian, Stylist, Good Housekeeping, TLS, Woman & Home, Mail on Sunday, Oprah Daily, Newsweek, etc, has the reader going in with sky-high expectations. And you know what? The book meets all those expectations.

Lessons in Chemistry is set in the America of the 60s and introduces us to scientist Elizabeth Zott, pretty as a picture, sharp as a pin, and one who will not suffer fools. Zott meets the love of her life Calvin Evans, another brilliant scientist, and life looks all set to turn rosy and remain rosy. Only, unexpected tragedy hits the two of them, and Zott is left to pick up the pieces and go on, for the sake of her daughter Mad. How Elizabeth crafts a living for herself, combing her two fields of expertise,  chemistry and cooking, and goes on to become a TV star,  forms the crux of this most engaging tale.

Where the story soars….

When you think about it, the story is about yet another woman down on her personal and professional  luck, and how she copes with the curveballs life throws at her. What makes the book rise and soar are the well delineated characters. There is Zott serious unsmiling, refusing to treat her women viewers like brainless bimbettes. There is Calvin Evans, your usual dour genius lacking social skills who becomes human only after getting together with Zott. There is the dog Six-Thirty who has at his command almost a thousand words of the English language, and what`s more,  puts some of them to startling good use; his musings of the meaning of words and on humans are a scream. There is Mad (Madeline on paper) Zott, vulnerable, as feisty as her mother but with a desperate desire to fit in. There is Harriet Sloane the neighbour with a heart of gold who walks into the Zott household one day temporarily fleeing her personal problems, and never quite leaves.    There is Walter Pine,  Elizabeth`s boss at the TV studios, who understands her but is also driven mad by her tendency to disregard his instructions and go alarmingly extempore. Altogether, it`s an unforgettable line-up.

The feminist angle? Why, it`s present on every page of the book, in how Zott Sr deals with sexual harassment, chauvinism and patriarchy at large; how Zott Jr learns early in life that there are some wonderful women that people mess with at their own peril; how Harriet finds her happy space in the rut of her less than satisfying life; how a member of Zott`s audience learns to rise above derision and follow her life`s ambitions. And the best part of it is, these lessons are more show than tell, delivering their capsule lessons of life neatly, without sermonising. Here is Elizabeth musing on men: She seemed to bring out to the worst in men. They either wanted to control her, touch her, dominate her, silence ger, correct her or tell her what to do. She didn’t understand why they couldn’t treat her as a fellow human being, as a colleague, a friend, an equal, or even a stranger on the street, someone to whom one is automatically respectful until you find out they’ve buried a bunch of bodies in the backyard.

The book contains large dollops of humour, heartbreak and immense charm. What`s not to love, I ask you?