The Other Einstein by Marie Benedict 5 stars, a best of 2016

[Megalion]

An enchanting novel based on a very intelligent and educated woman. A rarity for her time. We've never really heard of her or any of her potential scientific finds and achievements. Because she was deeply in the shadow of her famous husband, Albert Einstein.

Thanks to letters between her and Albert and also her bosom friend and other sources, the author was able to piece together a portait of the woman's intelligence and education.

The mystery is, for such an educated woman, why did she seemingly eschew her education and passion to be a housewife?

Given her background, wouldn't one think the probability that she played a large part in the scientific discoveries attributed to Einstein? She was never credited as having assisted but others were.

The author is very upfront with the fact that the actual why of the seemingly obvious omission is unknown. She cautions that her tale of their home life and relationship consisted of a lot of fictional imagination. To take her account with a big grain of salt and not hold much against Albert because of it.

This is important because Albert does not come across well. At all. I found myself downright ticked off cause it really is hard to believe she was that smart and educated yet no cited involvement. Yet was her absence from the citations voluntary? Did she truly not contribute? It seems so unlikely especially as her field of expertise was different from Albert's and his infamous equation could not have been reached without some help from someone in her field.

It's very good historical fiction though because we do learn about who they both were as young people and it punctuates the milestones in the famous one's discoveries and etc.

I'd love to hire St Mary's (from the delightful speculative historical fiction series by Jodi Taylor) to find out what really did happen. Was it an epic historical cheat of enduring acclaim? Or just a piece of fiction?

Thank you to the publisher for the advanced copy of this book in exchange for my honest review.

[Nicole R]

This on is on my TBR and I cannot wait to get to it!

[Megalion]

Hope it reads as well for you as it did for me

[Amy]

I'm delighted by the recommendation and quite interested. Surely I will get to it.

[Jennifer]

Very interesting. As the wife of a scientist, we should get a lot more credit than we do! :)