A Novel and Efficient Synthesis of Cadaverine

by S.A. Scoggin

Graduation week should be an exciting time for the Chemistry Department of Allston University, as they prepare to move from their shabby, haunted laboratories into a brand new building. Happily oblivious, they don't know that the President of the University, a candidate for an empty Senate seat and hungry for good publicity, is scheming to trade away their building to poach a Professor of Physics on the Nobel short list. The week might turn out to be more exciting than anyone had reckoned, what with the two different infernal devices stashed in the basement and the assassination scheduled for the dedication ceremony.

Genres: Science

472 pages, Paperback

First published November 18, 2009

Reviews

[cooldash · Rating 5 out of 5]

Excellent satire of graduate school woes, culminating in absurdity and murder. Chemists will appreciate all the (accurate!) technical jargon, and graduates will enjoy the critique/parody of academic politics. Multiple plot lines and varied characters' stories are told with a sharp, cynical, and often dark sense of humour. A perfect read for any chemistry grad student, practitioner of the dark organic synthetic arts, or just anyone who just wants to read a book about what happens when chemists at a third-tier university get all riled up.

[Christian · Rating 1 out of 5]

I really enjoyed reading about the adventures of the beleagured Chemistry grad students, which took me back to my undergrad days as a Chemistry major. But they were only flashes of brilliance in the steaming pile of garbage that is this book. The writing is so overly flowery, as if the author was trying to emulate a literary classic, but it comes across as more of a parody. When it started waxing political, I took that as my chance to check out.

[Blair · Rating 3 out of 5]

Part of me wanted to give the book four stars; that part of me is a chemist. I ultimately rated it three stars because of some truly glaring errors which detracted from the experience; my unabashed glee at reading a rather accurate book about chemists and the world around them had to be tempered by such things. I don't want to belabour this point, so I'll just say my issues revolve around spelling errors - really easy spelling errors at that - and some proofreading issues. I feel pedantic pointing this out, but in a book about academia that was obviously written by someone with academic experience, the author should understand that small details can derail projects in a big way. It sometimes feels as if the book were written by multiple authors...

Part of me can't help but wonder if even this was intentional, as some of these errors would easily have been picked up by some quick spell checking. Perhaps this was all part of some grander metaphor being expressed by the book; a troll for people like me, who dot the t's and cross their eyes whenever they see a rookie mistake. It would certainly fit as an extension of the book's themes; if true, then bravo, author, bravo. If not, then hire a better proofreader.

As for what I liked about the book, it was the attitude of the chemists and the messed-up world they inhabit. Only someone touched by the fickle hand of underfunded academia (and maybe local politics) could portray this world in such detail. As events progressed, I found the book changing from slice-of-life to mysterious thriller to morality play, complete with red herrings and false leads and characters who do unexpected things based on their first impressions.

It's this last bit that made me think the most. Certain characters, through an accumulation of events and missteps, are lead to make some very nasty choices - choices which underline a lack of morals, a criminal intent, a cruel streak that must be learned through hardship. I didn't like associating that with people like me - scientists, who are dedicated to seeking understanding of the world, not wreaking havoc upon it. Further thought lead me to realize the point of this; these people are still human, with all our attendant faults, and will make human choices when pushed to their limits.

The ending was totally unexpected but fitting, given it's a book about scientists. A minor detail, likely implemented without foreknowledge of the actions of others, can lead to an unexpected discovery - a leap forward in our understand of and relation to the natural world. Or maybe just a really fun story for other scientists; nowhere near perfect but still enjoyable to those in the know.

[Stephanie R. · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book is a "slice of life" novel about several professors and grad students in a dangerously dysfunctional chemistry department at the fictional Allston University in Boston. There were a lot of characters to keep track of in this book, and the narrative rapidly switches between them with fewer cues than I would like. It also took until about 25% of the way through the book for me to be sure that the narrative was linear. Halfway through, I went back to the beginning and started reading again, this time taking notes on which characters are professors vs. students, who their advisors are, who stole equipment from whom, and so on. It didn't help as much as I'd hoped.

Be warned: there is a LOT of chemistry jargon, and while I'm sure I understood more than a non-chemist, some of it went over my head. I suspect it resonates (lol) much more with chemistry grad students or professors. Believe me, I sympathize with the parts about scrambling for equipment that the PI won't let you buy, and when they get a new building the carefully planned lab has "minor substitutions" that make it total crap. There are a lot of segments that really illustrate what it's like to be a chemist and show off cool things we can do, such as the part where a character is working with t-butyl lithium or where the new grad students learn about Karen Wetterhahn (seriously, look her up). I loved those parts of the book--I just wish the whole plot was as good as these little vignettes. All of the events of the week are clearly building up to a climax, but then when it happens it's disappointing. The so-called dramatic ending doesn't include all of the characters who were involved, doesn't tie up other loose ends (I very badly wanted to know what happened to Professor Forget and what was under his seat!), and the ending is described so poorly I'm still not sure who graduated, what exactly happened to the building, and if anyone died in the big event.

I gave it 4 stars because I didn't have to pay money to read this book (found it on Scribd); otherwise it would be 3.

[Gennady Gorin · Rating 5 out of 5]

Like Neal Stephenson for chemists. A little bit too rapid-fire, so much that I'm not sure what actually happened at the end (or at the beginning) (maybe there was some blink-and-you'll-miss-it clue 300 pages away?), but overall I can only lament that this book was relatively short and so few others talk about the science and culture of chemistry. Wonderful stuff, just wonderful.