Lessons in Chemistry: A Novel

Description

A #1 global bestseller with more than eight million copies sold and named one of the best books of the year by multiple publications, Lessons in Chemistry is Bonnie Garmus’s witty and original historical novel about science, ambition and challenging the expectations placed on women.

In early 1960s California, chemist Elizabeth Zott is determined to be taken seriously in a profession dominated by men. At the Hastings Research Institute, her colleagues have decidedly unscientific ideas about equality, with one notable exception: brilliant, Nobel Prize-nominated chemist Calvin Evans, who is drawn to Elizabeth’s intelligence and independence.

But life does not unfold according to a predictable formula. A few years later, Elizabeth finds herself a single mother and the reluctant star of a hugely popular television cooking programme called Supper at Six.

Elizabeth approaches cooking the way she approaches everything else, through chemistry, logic and an unwillingness to conform. What begins as an unconventional cooking show soon becomes something much bigger.

As her audience grows, Elizabeth encourages women not only to rethink what happens in their kitchens, but also to question the limits society has placed on their lives.