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Ordinary Matter
In 1895 Alfred Nobel rewrote his will and left his fortune made in dynamite and munitions to generations of thinkers. Since 1901 women have been honoured with Nobel Prizes for their scientific research twenty times, including Marie Curie twice.
Spanning more than a century and ranging across the world, this inventive story collection is inspired by these women whose work has altered history and saved millions of lives. From a transformative visit to the Grand Canyon to a baby washing up on a Queensland beach, a climate protest during a Paris heatwave to Stockholm on the eve of the 1977 Nobel Prize ceremony, these stories interrogate the nature of inspiration and discovery, motherhood and sacrifice, illness and legacy. Sometimes the extraordinary pivots on the ordinary.
Spanning more than a century and ranging across the world, this inventive story collection is inspired by these women whose work has altered history and saved millions of lives. From a transformative visit to the Grand Canyon to a baby washing up on a Queensland beach, a climate protest during a Paris heatwave to Stockholm on the eve of the 1977 Nobel Prize ceremony, these stories interrogate the nature of inspiration and discovery, motherhood and sacrifice, illness and legacy. Sometimes the extraordinary pivots on the ordinary.
288 pages, Paperback
First published September 1, 2020
19 people are currently reading
462 people want to read
About the author
Laura Elvery
10 books40 followersLaura Elvery is a writer from Brisbane. Her work has been published in The Big Issue Fiction Edition, Review of Australian Fiction, Kill Your Darlings and Griffith Review. She has won the Josephine Ulrick Prize for Literature and the Margaret River Short Story Competition, and was awarded a Griffith Review Queensland Writing Fellowship. She has been shortlisted for the Overland NUW Fair Australia, Neilma Sidney and Victoria University prizes. In 2016, Laura was shortlisted for the Queensland Literary Award for an unpublished manuscript.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 34 reviews
August 23, 2020
A beautiful collection. Each story is somehow inspired by a woman winner of a science Nobel prize - some have very clear connections, while others spin off from a small connection. They're all lovely - capturing humanity in tiny moments. Elvery's a great writer - everything feels effortless, despite what must have been an enormous amount of work. Another great new local book in this very weird year.
(Disclaimer: UQP sent me a freebie of this)
(Disclaimer: UQP sent me a freebie of this)
August 26, 2020
I love high-concept short story collections like Laura Elizabeth Woollett’s The Love of a Bad Man and Karen E Bender’s Refund. Here, Elvery writes a story inspired by each of the 20 women who have won a Nobel Prize for science (two for Marie Curie). She goes to places mundane and unexpected and each story feels bold and fresh while the collection as a whole holds together seamlessly. Wonderful writing too. Highly recommend.
August 19, 2020
I’ve always struggled with short stories, far preferring the novel as a fictional form. But more and more collections of short stories written by Australian women are being released, or at least it seems so, and I wanted to give short stories another chance, just in case I was cheating myself out of something. Unfortunately, while I did enjoy particular stories within this collection, some definitely more than others, I think I am pretty certain that short stories will never work for me. A few of them only reeled me in the final paragraphs, and then they were over just as things seemed to get interesting. I also felt a bit discombobulated whilst reading because I thought all of these short stories were going to be about each of the women who have won a Nobel Prize for science, however, each story was instead inspired by the work of that woman, but more often than not, I failed to grasp that connection as it was so obscure. Each story opened with the year, name of the woman who won, and what they won for. Only one story in the entire collection was clearly about the woman and the win, if that makes sense. Coincidently, it’s the one I have quoted from below, because it was also the story I liked the most.
‘Winning does not mean only joy will follow. Winning does not stop sadness. You have to be tougher than all that and forget the faceless men from your past who failed to have faith in you, who pointed out that you were indeed a woman, and not a good bet to join their program, their hospital, their team. To be obsessed with fairness, with what is owed, well, that mustn’t enter into it. Not today. Certainly not tomorrow. Focus on all the luck you have received. Polish it like a coin.’ – Stockholm (1977, Rosalyn Yalow, Physiology or Medicine, Prize Motivation: ‘for the development of radioimmunoassays of peptide hormones’.)
The author notes at the end of the book were more interesting than the stories (for me). They did offer some more context which in turn helped me think back to each story and make a bit more sense of it in terms of seeing the connection that had eluded me whilst reading it. I wonder if it might have been better to preface each story with this information instead of having it in the end in the author note. It really would have helped me understand each story more. I’m not good though with reading fiction and not ‘getting it’. It kind of just annoys me, to be honest, and makes me feel insignificant as a reader, or not clever enough to understand the underlying themes or reasons for the story. The quote below is the author note that corresponds with the story I have quoted above.
Stockholm, 1977, Rosalyn Yalow, Physiology or Medicine – Rosalyn Yalow conducted revolutionary work with her long-time lab partner, Solomon ‘Sol’ Berson, that resulted in the radioimmunoassay – which provided the capacity to test for incredibly small measures of substances in liquids like water and blood. On 10 December 1977, Yalow collected her Nobel Prize without Berson, who died in 1972 (Nobels cannot be awarded posthumously). Yalow and Berson never patented their work, which had direct and far-reaching impacts on diabetes treatments and physicians’ understanding of insulin, hepatitis and cancer. Yalow raised two children alongside her demanding lab schedule. – Author note.
Readers who are fans of short stories will doubtlessly enjoy this collection and appreciate the author’s intent far more than me. Probably, all of you should ignore this review and just make your own mind up about reading it based on whether you like short stories or not. The cover is stunning though and really does seem to convey a lot about the collection within.
Thanks is extended to UQP for providing me with a copy of Ordinary Matter for review.
‘Winning does not mean only joy will follow. Winning does not stop sadness. You have to be tougher than all that and forget the faceless men from your past who failed to have faith in you, who pointed out that you were indeed a woman, and not a good bet to join their program, their hospital, their team. To be obsessed with fairness, with what is owed, well, that mustn’t enter into it. Not today. Certainly not tomorrow. Focus on all the luck you have received. Polish it like a coin.’ – Stockholm (1977, Rosalyn Yalow, Physiology or Medicine, Prize Motivation: ‘for the development of radioimmunoassays of peptide hormones’.)
The author notes at the end of the book were more interesting than the stories (for me). They did offer some more context which in turn helped me think back to each story and make a bit more sense of it in terms of seeing the connection that had eluded me whilst reading it. I wonder if it might have been better to preface each story with this information instead of having it in the end in the author note. It really would have helped me understand each story more. I’m not good though with reading fiction and not ‘getting it’. It kind of just annoys me, to be honest, and makes me feel insignificant as a reader, or not clever enough to understand the underlying themes or reasons for the story. The quote below is the author note that corresponds with the story I have quoted above.
Stockholm, 1977, Rosalyn Yalow, Physiology or Medicine – Rosalyn Yalow conducted revolutionary work with her long-time lab partner, Solomon ‘Sol’ Berson, that resulted in the radioimmunoassay – which provided the capacity to test for incredibly small measures of substances in liquids like water and blood. On 10 December 1977, Yalow collected her Nobel Prize without Berson, who died in 1972 (Nobels cannot be awarded posthumously). Yalow and Berson never patented their work, which had direct and far-reaching impacts on diabetes treatments and physicians’ understanding of insulin, hepatitis and cancer. Yalow raised two children alongside her demanding lab schedule. – Author note.
Readers who are fans of short stories will doubtlessly enjoy this collection and appreciate the author’s intent far more than me. Probably, all of you should ignore this review and just make your own mind up about reading it based on whether you like short stories or not. The cover is stunning though and really does seem to convey a lot about the collection within.
Thanks is extended to UQP for providing me with a copy of Ordinary Matter for review.
September 19, 2020
Let’s be clear: the stories in Ordinary Matter aren’t about the women who won the Nobel Prizes, or even necessarily the work they did to win them. Instead, the stories are inspired by them, often only tangentially related to their discoveries. Without the link highlighted by the winner’s name and commendation appearing at the beginning of each story, you’d probably never make the connection. Overall, Ordinary Matter is a mixed bag, but the premise alone will be enough to draw you in.
My full review of Ordinary Matter is up now on Keeping Up With The Penguins.
My full review of Ordinary Matter is up now on Keeping Up With The Penguins.
August 24, 2020
Laura Elvery’s second collection of short stories, Ordinary Matter (UQP 2020) is anything but ordinary. In fact, this anthology is quite an extraordinary collation of seemingly disparate tales – some historical, some futuristic, some quite esoteric and some straightforward and scientific – that hang together with the common bond that each features a female winner of the Nobel Prize for Science. There have been 20 such winners over the years since 1901 when Marie Curie was first awarded her Nobel Prize for Physics. Some of the stories feature these women in very obvious and direct ways, with the woman the protagonist or somehow the centre of the narrative. In other stories, the link between the prize-winner and the story is tangential or obscure or abstract. But in every one of these 20 short stories, Elvery has combined literature with science to produce an alchemy of brilliance.
My recommendation for reading this collection is to read them in historical order, as they are presented. I read each one and then read the Author’s Notes at the back of the book on that particular story. I found this to be the ideal way to get the most out of each story: I came to every new story fresh and without any preconceived ideas about its content (although Elvery does preface each chapter helpfully with a small note about the name of the woman and what she was awarded the prize for), and I was able to read without prejudice. Reading the notes afterwards – discovering how cleverly the author had intertwined fact with fiction, or how convoluted a connection she had made between the words and the history – filled me with delight. Sometimes the prize-winning scientist is only a footnote to the story, almost an afterthought, a thin and fragile line that, in a sliding door moment, could be so easily broken. Every story is thoughtful and beautifully crafted, with words that sing.
I had read a few of these stories when they were published in previous literary journals or collections, but as I reread them, I relished the feeling that it is here – in THIS collection – that each has found its spiritual home. Like beads on a string, every one is whole and complete, but added together they form something wonderful.
I loved the two stories featuring Marie Curie, the only woman to win the Nobel Prize for Science twice. Something Close to Gold, about a baby washed up on a beach, is a wonder. My other favourites include Corn Queen, The Garden Bridge, The Town Turns Over and perhaps my favourite of all, Little Fly. Featuring settings as diverse as the Grand Canyon, Queensland, Stockholm and the US, and spanning more than a century, this collection is inspired by the ‘women whose work has altered history and saved millions of lives’.
There are so many poetic and poignant lines to be found in this writing:
‘The evening held the heat from the day like a bell jar.’
‘Everything looked different now that we were frightened.’
‘How strange, then, that those women still felt something like triumph go through their bodies when they saw the destruction they had created.’
‘It takes as long as it takes and it always has, always will.’
‘Both outlived those terrible men.’
‘We got lost when we couldn’t find our way to the end.’
‘Yes, she catches her name and holds it tight.’
‘It was clear to all of us on that beach that humanity stood on a precipice.’
This is a remarkable collection that speaks to our collective curiosity in the field of science, the particular role women play in that quest, and the complex mix of ‘ingenuity and discovery, motherhood and sacrifice, illness and legacy’ that is entangled in the scientific advances made by women and the struggles they have encountered along the way. But even if you have no interest in science, this book stands alone as a collection of brilliant stories that each leave you feeling slightly bereft, or a little bit stunned, a step closer to happiness or within arm’s reach of hope.
My recommendation for reading this collection is to read them in historical order, as they are presented. I read each one and then read the Author’s Notes at the back of the book on that particular story. I found this to be the ideal way to get the most out of each story: I came to every new story fresh and without any preconceived ideas about its content (although Elvery does preface each chapter helpfully with a small note about the name of the woman and what she was awarded the prize for), and I was able to read without prejudice. Reading the notes afterwards – discovering how cleverly the author had intertwined fact with fiction, or how convoluted a connection she had made between the words and the history – filled me with delight. Sometimes the prize-winning scientist is only a footnote to the story, almost an afterthought, a thin and fragile line that, in a sliding door moment, could be so easily broken. Every story is thoughtful and beautifully crafted, with words that sing.
I had read a few of these stories when they were published in previous literary journals or collections, but as I reread them, I relished the feeling that it is here – in THIS collection – that each has found its spiritual home. Like beads on a string, every one is whole and complete, but added together they form something wonderful.
I loved the two stories featuring Marie Curie, the only woman to win the Nobel Prize for Science twice. Something Close to Gold, about a baby washed up on a beach, is a wonder. My other favourites include Corn Queen, The Garden Bridge, The Town Turns Over and perhaps my favourite of all, Little Fly. Featuring settings as diverse as the Grand Canyon, Queensland, Stockholm and the US, and spanning more than a century, this collection is inspired by the ‘women whose work has altered history and saved millions of lives’.
There are so many poetic and poignant lines to be found in this writing:
‘The evening held the heat from the day like a bell jar.’
‘Everything looked different now that we were frightened.’
‘How strange, then, that those women still felt something like triumph go through their bodies when they saw the destruction they had created.’
‘It takes as long as it takes and it always has, always will.’
‘Both outlived those terrible men.’
‘We got lost when we couldn’t find our way to the end.’
‘Yes, she catches her name and holds it tight.’
‘It was clear to all of us on that beach that humanity stood on a precipice.’
This is a remarkable collection that speaks to our collective curiosity in the field of science, the particular role women play in that quest, and the complex mix of ‘ingenuity and discovery, motherhood and sacrifice, illness and legacy’ that is entangled in the scientific advances made by women and the struggles they have encountered along the way. But even if you have no interest in science, this book stands alone as a collection of brilliant stories that each leave you feeling slightly bereft, or a little bit stunned, a step closer to happiness or within arm’s reach of hope.
September 24, 2020
The 20 short stories in this beautiful collection are a tribute to the 20 women who have won Nobel Prizes for scientific research throughout the history of the awards. The stories begin with Marie Curie in 1903 and approach the lives and work of the women who follow her mostly obliquely, not always historically, but always in imaginative and unique ways. This is a meticulously crafted work, right down to sentence level, and is a fitting tribute to these mostly forgotten or unknown women of science.
November 9, 2020
3.5 stars
'This was a beach.'
'Is a beach not wilderness?'
Pure poetry. From a bureaucrat. I wondered if he ever wrote things in a notebook at night before turning out the light as I did. This was the man who would decide our fate.'
From 'Something Close to Gold.'
This short story collection features women who have won the Nobel Prize, beginning with Marie Curie in 1903. Some stories interpret the essence of the achievement in abstract ways, others, explore different times in the life of the protagonist and others use elements of magical realism to explore points.
An enjoyable read, that I found dipped off for me in the middle. My favourite stories are: 'Something close to gold', 'Corn Queen' and "Little Fly.'
'The baby has a secret.
Just yesterday the baby learnt her name, but today she can't remember it. She hopes someone (her mother is her favourite) will say it again. She will listen closely and single it out among all the other sounds her mother makes, and try to hold onto it the way her father holds that shell.'
From 'Little Fly.'
'This was a beach.'
'Is a beach not wilderness?'
Pure poetry. From a bureaucrat. I wondered if he ever wrote things in a notebook at night before turning out the light as I did. This was the man who would decide our fate.'
From 'Something Close to Gold.'
This short story collection features women who have won the Nobel Prize, beginning with Marie Curie in 1903. Some stories interpret the essence of the achievement in abstract ways, others, explore different times in the life of the protagonist and others use elements of magical realism to explore points.
An enjoyable read, that I found dipped off for me in the middle. My favourite stories are: 'Something close to gold', 'Corn Queen' and "Little Fly.'
'The baby has a secret.
Just yesterday the baby learnt her name, but today she can't remember it. She hopes someone (her mother is her favourite) will say it again. She will listen closely and single it out among all the other sounds her mother makes, and try to hold onto it the way her father holds that shell.'
From 'Little Fly.'
January 11, 2021
Ordinary Matters is a short story collection with a difference – each of the stories are inspired by the women who have won the Nobel Prize. Since 1901, women have been recognised for their efforts in science through the Nobel Prize twenty times starting with Marie Curie.
The premise really appealed to me. At the start of each story the name of the woman, the year she won and for what is listed and then at the end there is an Author’s Note which provides some context of what the woman who won the Prize won for and some detail of the life and times she lived in. I read each story then flipped to the end to read the summary for each scientist which I think worked really well.
I understood going in that this was not a short story collection about the prize winners but rather stories that were inspired by them or linked to their discoveries but I was somewhat thrown by just how little link there was especially in the stories towards the end.
The initial stories had clear links – Marie Curie and her daughters are characters in the first story (though not the main voice) so I had expected this to continue but by the latter half there seemed to be almost no discernible connection to the scientist or her research. Perhaps I was missing the subtle clues? However this is simply a matter of expectations as the stories were all within themselves quite excellently written.
The stories span centuries and some are set in the future. There are stories set in the Grand Canyon, Stockholm and closer to home in Queensland. Some focus on the minutia of life while others present an almost fantastical reality. My favourite Something Close to Gold is about a baby that washes up on the beach and is discovered by a woman desperate to become a mother. This is a wondrously written and heartfelt story.
Overall I found the writing mesmerising however I perhaps didn’t love it quite as much as I hoped. If you do pick this up head into it understanding that these stories will not give you a historical insight into the winners of the Nobel Prize but each are very well written short stories about women and their importance in this world.
The premise really appealed to me. At the start of each story the name of the woman, the year she won and for what is listed and then at the end there is an Author’s Note which provides some context of what the woman who won the Prize won for and some detail of the life and times she lived in. I read each story then flipped to the end to read the summary for each scientist which I think worked really well.
I understood going in that this was not a short story collection about the prize winners but rather stories that were inspired by them or linked to their discoveries but I was somewhat thrown by just how little link there was especially in the stories towards the end.
The initial stories had clear links – Marie Curie and her daughters are characters in the first story (though not the main voice) so I had expected this to continue but by the latter half there seemed to be almost no discernible connection to the scientist or her research. Perhaps I was missing the subtle clues? However this is simply a matter of expectations as the stories were all within themselves quite excellently written.
The stories span centuries and some are set in the future. There are stories set in the Grand Canyon, Stockholm and closer to home in Queensland. Some focus on the minutia of life while others present an almost fantastical reality. My favourite Something Close to Gold is about a baby that washes up on the beach and is discovered by a woman desperate to become a mother. This is a wondrously written and heartfelt story.
Overall I found the writing mesmerising however I perhaps didn’t love it quite as much as I hoped. If you do pick this up head into it understanding that these stories will not give you a historical insight into the winners of the Nobel Prize but each are very well written short stories about women and their importance in this world.
September 9, 2024
This is a really interesting thematic device that ties this collection together, however loosely. Contained a wide range of approaches, including historical and spec-fic. There were easy standouts in this collection: "Wingspan" "Little Fly" and "Something Close to Gold." The last two in particular both have babies as the main part of the narrative, and Little Fly is the kind of story that I want to deconstruct further to study the style of. It is a beautiful story that teeters nicely on the brink of magical realism/spec fic, through using a baby's perspective. A wonderful study in narrative voice, and control of detail, that quite took my breath away and read it again immedately. "Wingspan" is expansive, exploring several familial relationships, and wonderfully meaty in scope.
Far more stories approached parenthood and motherhood than expected, and really appreciated this concept lying alongside female scientific pursuit.
"Hyperobject" would definitely be worth reading alongside a viewing of Oppenheimer.
"She relished the sweetness of being horizontal and silent on her soft bed."
Far more stories approached parenthood and motherhood than expected, and really appreciated this concept lying alongside female scientific pursuit.
"Hyperobject" would definitely be worth reading alongside a viewing of Oppenheimer.
"She relished the sweetness of being horizontal and silent on her soft bed."
February 14, 2021
The concept of this book is brilliant. The collection of short stories is inspired by the twenty women who have won Nobel prizes for science. The collection has motivated me to find out more about these women, many of whom faced serious academic and financial struggles as well as the problems of being women and geniuses often well ahead of their time. So for that I am grateful to this author. However, I found this collection to be a mixed bag. I like that the stories often centred on challenges in domestic and family life. My favourite being Titan Arum which was about kinship care. This focus on the everyday is reflected in the title. But more often than not I struggled to understand how each story was inspired by the woman scientist or her work. Still the collection has left me with a project- to learn more about the amazing women of science who inspired the collection. Major tip- make sure you read the brief summary of each scientist before reading the short story inspired by her. It provides some orientation to each story.
January 17, 2021
A collection of short stories, inspired by the women who've won the Nobel Prize throughout history. It's an interesting concept and obviously well researched. Each woman's achievement is linked in some way to the corresponding tale, though some are more overtly connected than others. There is a range of time and place presented, and the narratives work best I think if read in chronological order of the winners, as presented in the book. I read each story then read the blurb on the award winner provided at the back and this helped to see the connection between the people and the stories, although some I'm still not sure exactly how they fit together. A number of the stories are magical realism, and they are all about women and their place in society. I wouldn't usually read this genre but the book was recommended to me. It was well written, and I know that several of my friends would really enjoy the themes and concepts.
November 3, 2020
Ordinary Matter is a collection of 20 short stories that draws inspiration from female Nobel Prize winners and their works within the Science field. The first story opened up with Marie Curie, the 1903 winner all the way to the last story which closed with Frances Arnold, the 2018 winner. Some stories are based solely on these women and their lives however the majority are very loosely connected to an element or two, involving completely different fictional characters.
The premise of the book is certainly original and interesting. A number of the stories look at the simpler, everyday events that are close to reality while others are more inventive and told from really unique perspectives. The notable highlights for me are those that are more contemporary - namely ‘Witnessing’ and ‘Something Close to Gold’. There’s no doubt that Elvery’s writing is beautiful. She’s one of those writers that have a quiet way in telling a story that would really draw you in.
I did, however, struggle to wrap my head around the timelines of some of the stories and it felt a bit jumpy at times. I found it difficult to keep up with which period the stories are set in as they didn’t match with the prize winning year, and whether the stories are set in the present, past or future. I think i would’ve found it helpful if the timeline was laid out clearer in each story - but that could just be me though, i haven’t heard the same comment from any other reviewers!
Though this one wasn’t my favourite collection, it’s still well worth adding to your list - especially if you’re a fan of short stories.
The premise of the book is certainly original and interesting. A number of the stories look at the simpler, everyday events that are close to reality while others are more inventive and told from really unique perspectives. The notable highlights for me are those that are more contemporary - namely ‘Witnessing’ and ‘Something Close to Gold’. There’s no doubt that Elvery’s writing is beautiful. She’s one of those writers that have a quiet way in telling a story that would really draw you in.
I did, however, struggle to wrap my head around the timelines of some of the stories and it felt a bit jumpy at times. I found it difficult to keep up with which period the stories are set in as they didn’t match with the prize winning year, and whether the stories are set in the present, past or future. I think i would’ve found it helpful if the timeline was laid out clearer in each story - but that could just be me though, i haven’t heard the same comment from any other reviewers!
Though this one wasn’t my favourite collection, it’s still well worth adding to your list - especially if you’re a fan of short stories.
September 4, 2021
Story 1 (You Run Towards Love): 4/5
Story 2 (Grand Canyon): 4/5
Story 3 (Something Close to Gold): 5/5 Amazing
Story 4 ( Night Blindness): 3/5
Story 5 (Hyperobject): 3/5
Story 6 (Frost): 4/5
Story 7 (Stockholm): 3/5
Story 8 (Corn Queen): 4/5
Story 9 (Growth): 3/5
Story 10 (Witnessing): 5/5
Story 11 (Fruit Flies): 3/5
Story 12 (Titan Arum): 4.5/5
Story 13 (The Bodies Are Buried): 3/5
Story 14 (Better Nature): 4/5
Story 15: (Wingspan): 5/5
Story 16 (The Garden Bridge): 5/5
Story 17 (The Town Turns Over): 3/5
Story 18 (Little Fly): 5/5
Story 19 (The Fix): 4/5
Story 20 (A Brief History of Petroleum): 3/5
Story 2 (Grand Canyon): 4/5
Story 3 (Something Close to Gold): 5/5 Amazing
Story 4 ( Night Blindness): 3/5
Story 5 (Hyperobject): 3/5
Story 6 (Frost): 4/5
Story 7 (Stockholm): 3/5
Story 8 (Corn Queen): 4/5
Story 9 (Growth): 3/5
Story 10 (Witnessing): 5/5
Story 11 (Fruit Flies): 3/5
Story 12 (Titan Arum): 4.5/5
Story 13 (The Bodies Are Buried): 3/5
Story 14 (Better Nature): 4/5
Story 15: (Wingspan): 5/5
Story 16 (The Garden Bridge): 5/5
Story 17 (The Town Turns Over): 3/5
Story 18 (Little Fly): 5/5
Story 19 (The Fix): 4/5
Story 20 (A Brief History of Petroleum): 3/5
October 6, 2020
I found it super fascinating reading about the 20 women awarded the Nobel prize for science. It prompted further research of them individually and I’m awfully embarrassed how little I knew about them prior to this novel. Their discoveries were eloquently brought to life through the mundane, although some were more abstract. I did find myself struggling to follow some of the stories. However I loved Night Blindness, Hyperobject, the Bodies are Buried and The Fix!
December 9, 2020
The writing is beautiful although the stories are a little uneven. Some seem to finish too early, the characters feeling underdeveloped. But some were exquisite: Little Fly, The Bodies are Buried, and others well contained, whether of a short timespan (Fruit flies, Growth) or extended (A Brief History of Petroleum). Generally, the book was an immersive experience with a bonus of learning more about female Nobel Prize winners.
July 18, 2021
"You want to be as smart as you can, my father told me when i was a girl in Colorado. As brave as you can. As trustworthy and honest. You can never be too much of any of those things"
I would have loved this book more if the stories were directly linked to the women scientists or the discoveries they made, two women made breaking discoveries around insulin which has forever changed my life.
I did find the writing beautiful.
I would have loved this book more if the stories were directly linked to the women scientists or the discoveries they made, two women made breaking discoveries around insulin which has forever changed my life.
I did find the writing beautiful.
July 4, 2021
A collection of short stories. Short stories belong to a genre which is not to my liking. Finishing this book was a relief. I only kept reading in the hope there would be at least one decent story. The snippets on female Nobel prize winners at the start of every story - while fascinating, seemed pointless and the quality of the book would not be diminished by their omission.
November 24, 2020
I really enjoyed this book of short stories about women. Each story is inspired by a female Nobel Prize winner for science; I did think each story would be about said winners but that wasn't the case. Nevertheless a good read.
December 27, 2020
DNF... unfortunately the writing just didn’t do it for me. I really enjoyed this authors first short story collection but found this lacked depth. I also think I went into this expecting something different.
June 18, 2021
Absolutely captivating - each story drew me in and I was disappointed to realise that the story was over - so engaging! Would be a wonderful book in education, particularly to engage young people with short stories.
June 18, 2021
These are beautiful stories that invite the reader into a moment of each protagonist’s life. The characters are rich and relatable and I loved exploring the link with the Nobel prize winner inspiration for each story.
October 18, 2021
This collection of short stories is quite good and interesting in the way it is presented. Each short story is vaguely linked to a female winner of the Nobel chemistry or physics prize. Definitely worth a read.
April 23, 2022
This was a book club pic. I don't ordinarily choose to read short stories. I liked the link to the female winners of the Nobel Prize. Some of the stories worked better than others. Hence an overall rating of 2.
October 12, 2020
A superb collection of beguiling, haunting, and insightful stories.
October 17, 2020
3.5 stars
June 18, 2021
Ordinary Matter would be an excellent choice for inclusion in Secondary School curriculum. The focus on women of achievement in this short story collection is exactly what’s needed in education.
June 25, 2021
Loved this book! I learnt so much about these amazing women and loved learning about their research and prize through the short story created by Laura.
June 30, 2021
Engaging, precise writing about interesting women.
January 4, 2025
I do not usually read collections of short stories but these cleverly-crafted vignettes are a different genre altogether.
Displaying 1 - 30 of 34 reviews