Lessons in Chemistry book club questions, by chapter
Elizabeth Zott, a chemist in 1950s California who is never allowed to be one, ends up hosting a cooking show and teaching a nation of housewives chemistry.
The questions are grouped by how far you have read. Each group asks only about what has happened by that point, so you can talk about the book before everyone has finished it. The first two groups are here. The rest are inside EpyLog and show up as you read.
The first pages
Assumes you have read the first chapter or so
- The book opens in 1961 with Elizabeth packing her daughter's lunch and a note: play sports, don't let the boys win. What did that note tell you about her before anything else did?
- Madeline, five years old, reading Dickens at school and told to stop. Did you laugh, or wince?
- Then the book jumps back to Hastings in 1952. Did the jump change what you were hoping for?
- Elizabeth walks into Calvin Evans's lab and takes his beakers. What did that scene tell you about both of them?
- The way the men at Hastings talk to Elizabeth. Which line did you recognize from your own life?
Through chapter 11
Assumes you have read through chapter 11
- Calvin throws up on Elizabeth at the theatre. When did you decide this was a love story?
- Calvin asks Elizabeth to marry him and she says no, because her work would become his. Which of her words stayed with you?
- The pencil, and what she did with it at UCLA. Did the book earn that scene?
- Elizabeth learns to row. What did the boat do for her that the lab could not?
- The dog is named Six-Thirty for the time he was found. Did his chapters win you over?
- Calvin talks to Elizabeth as an equal from their first real conversation. When had a book last surprised you like that?
- Elizabeth and Calvin living together, unmarried, in 1952. Which neighbour's look did you picture?
The rest of the book
Through chapter 23 · Through chapter 33 · When you have finished
21 more questions for Lessons in Chemistry are inside EpyLog. Add the book and they show up as you read: 8 through chapter 23, 8 through chapter 33, 5 when you have finished. Send your friends the link and each of them sees the questions at their own chapter, and nothing past it.
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