A review by mikeebeth
Her Hidden Genius, by Marie Benedict

informative reflective medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? No
• Loveable characters? No
• Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
• Flaws of characters a main focus? No

1.0

Where do I even begin? This is one of the worst books I've ever read. I would have stopped at the first page if this wasn't something I had to read for work. I picked it for the book club because it was historical fiction (which my group was interested in reading more of) and highly rated and reviewed. I was also interested in the subject. But it has clumsy exposition, one-dimensional characters, and repetitive events.

It opens with a try-hard description of the mist on the Seine, and we get the first awkward description of the scientist main character's beliefs. 

Papa would call it heaven touching earth, but I believe in science, not God. 

Thankfully the overly flowery descriptions stop after the first part of the book, but there are ELEVEN awkward passages like this about Franklin's beliefs, including three of her using magic, angels, and God in typical, everyday ways that wouldn't necessarily indicate belief in them, with her caveat "not that I believe in any of that."

I don't find the dialogue written in a natural way, which for me is a big turn-off. For a book that's supposed to be about a feminist icon, I didn't find this fictional version of Rosalind Franklin to be very well-rounded. It seemed like her only personality trait is that she believes in science and she's blunt. Her relationships with the other characters are also fairly one-dimensional. Her parents want her to be their idealized version of what a woman should be and her colleagues are either her sworn enemies or think she's the smartest most wonderful person to ever exist.

Spoiler

Through the middle part of the book where Rosalind is dealing with the rampant sexism in King's College, there are multiple chapters that's just Rosalind trying to put on a brave face in front of her outside colleagues, family, and friends, breaking down crying, and her family member/colleague/friend saying "there, there, you're wonderful and amazing and don't give up." It doesn't do anything to develop her actual relationships with those people and is just repetitive.

Spoiler

I'm not sure how much to take issue with the depiction of her relationships with Watson, Crick, and Wilkins based on what I could find out about their actual relationships, since this is a work of fiction. From what I could find out, she was actually friends with Crick and his wife, whereas the novel paints Crick as completely in opposition to Rosalind. I also found that Rosalind's family revealed that she was unhappy at King's College less because of the sexism and more because she was an agnostic Jewish person in a protestant environment and didn't feel she fit in for that reason. (Which, the author describes a Jewish man's nose as "hawklike," which is not great). So while I believe that Dr. Franklin in real life certainly had her share of sexism to deal with, and Watson's book is in fact quite sexist, it sounds like her relationship with Watson and Crick wasn't quite as adversarial as this novel and the white feminist narrative around her would suggest.

If historical fiction is your thing maybe check this out but overall I do NOT recommend.