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Critics' Opinion:
Readers' Opinion:
First Published:
May 2016, 320 pages
Paperback:
Mar 2017, 368 pages
Book Reviewed by:
Rebecca Foster
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In the spirit of The Aviator's Wife and Loving Frank, this resonant debut spans the years from World War II through the Vietnam War to tell the story of a woman whose scientific ambition is caught up in her relationships with two very different men.
For Meridian Wallace - and many other smart, driven women of the 1940s - being ambitious meant being an outlier. Ever since she was a young girl, Meridian had been obsessed with birds, and she was determined to get her PhD, become an ornithologist, and make her mother's sacrifices to send her to college pay off. But she didn't expect to fall in love with her brilliant physics professor, Alden Whetstone. When he's recruited to Los Alamos, New Mexico, to take part in a mysterious wartime project, she reluctantly defers her own plans and joins him.
What began as an exciting intellectual partnership devolves into a "traditional" marriage. And while the life of a housewife quickly proves stifling, it's not until years later, when Meridian meets a Vietnam veteran who opens her eyes to how the world is changing, that she realizes just how much she has given up. The repercussions of choosing a different path, though, may be too heavy a burden to bear.
Elizabeth Church's stirring debut novel about ambition, identity, and sacrifice will ring true to every woman who has had to make the impossible choice between who she is and who circumstances demand her to be.
Excerpt
The Atomic Weight of Love
Flight requires defiance of gravity and is really, when you think about it, a bold act."
The professor at the front of the lecture hall paused for dramatic effect, but as far as I could see, I was the only fully engrossed member of the audience. I wasn't enrolled in the class but had instead taken a seat at another professor's suggestion. I was enraptured not only because I felt I was looking at a wild man — someone whose long, tussled hair intimated that he had rushed in from a hike along some windblown cliff to lecture to a bunch of physics students — but more so because I knew he could explain mysteries to me, decipher Newton and the others and render them comprehensible on a practical level. My expectations were high, and Alden Whetstone met them.
"We think about vertebrate flight as falling into four categories: parachuting, gliding, actual flight, and soaring. If a bird can soar, generally speaking, it can also perform the ...
Here are some of the comments posted about The Atomic Weight of Love.
You can see the full discussion here.
A Murder of Crows, etc.
"Tidbits" (the word used in the comment above) is exactly what I had in mind. I enjoyed it. - rebeccar
Anachronism
Much like the scene in the movie [i] Somewhere in Time [/i] where Christopher Reeve's character finds the modern day coin in his pocket and is jolted out of the past, there was one anachronism for me on page 144 when there's a joking reference to ... - rebeccar
Compare and contrast the gifts Meridian receives from Alden and from Clay.
Alden's gifts demonstrate how little he really knew her. I believe he thought she would appreciate them. But he didn't really try to know her at all so he wouldn't realize how inappropriate they really were. Clay's gifts demonstrate how well he ... - jodig
Did Alden love Meridian? Did Meridian love Alden? How do you know? Did she make the right decision?
I think that they mistook a common passion and intelligence for love. In the beginning, Meridian chose Alden over the other suitor (flawed as he was) but it took a while! I agree that Alden's personality was too selfish to truly love Meridian in the ... - amberb
Discuss Meridian's friendships with Belle and Emma. How do women's friendships illuminate their lives differently than the friendships between men?
I feel like Meri's friendships with Emma and Belle filled different gaps in her life - addresses different deep needs she had. Belle taught her to love life, be free, to just live. From when she was young and the death of her father, Meri did not ... - jodig
Church has a deep understanding of how marriage works: its constant sacrifices and compromises, and how much we can define ourselves by and depend on our partners. Passages recounting the everyday dilemmas and conversations of a marriage feel very true to life. This would make an excellent book club read. There is so much to think about and discuss – especially relationships, women's rights, and moral decisions...continued
Full Review
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(Reviewed by Rebecca Foster).
Caroline Leavitt, New York Times bestselling author of Is This Tomorrow and Pictures of You
Oh, what a incandescent debut!... So engrossing, I couldn't wait to read another page, and so alive, I never wanted the story to end. Tara Conklin, author of The House Girl
This exquisite debut is the beautifully written story of a woman who must negotiate the tricky terrain of love, responsibility, ambition and sacrifice. In her impeccable portrayal of a long marriage, Elizabeth Church weaves together the historical and the personal and shows the impossible choices women faced - and still face - between family and self.
In Elizabeth Church's debut novel, The Atomic Weight of Love, Meridian Wallace studies crow behavior over the course of decades. The Corvid family – which includes crows, rooks, magpies, ravens, and jays – is often considered to have the highest intelligence and most remarkable habits in the bird world. Here are some facts that help explain Meri's fascination:
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