Dr. Steven J. Fisher is fascinated by the elusive nature of the female orgasm, passionately proclaiming it “the last great unexplored territory.” But for all of his scientific candor about human sexuality in the lab, Dr. Fisher is really just a shy chemist who is a beginner in the ways of love. Trock, a major pharmaceutical company, has sponsored his Oxford research team to develop the first pill to cure Female Sexual Dysfunction, and Dr. Fisher is just weeks away from launching his miracle cure at their upcoming conference. When a beautiful and brilliant (and orgasmically challenged) Ph.D. student named Annie begins participating in his study, everything Dr. Fisher thinks he knows about women is turned on its head—and his research becomes more and more complicated with the addition of her perplexing data. Is it the pill making her feel this way, or is it love? What scientific phenomenon can explain the changes in his own feelings? With pressure mounting from the Trock, Annie’s mystery must be solved by any means possible. Cleverly presented through excerpts from Steven’s clinical study and Annie’s blog entries—Chemistry for Beginners gets to the heart of what makes us all tick, showing that love is in fact, all about chemistry.
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Twenty-eight women have now participated in the sexual dysfunction research project here at the Department of Molecular Biology, University of Oxford. Our approach is empirical: that is to say, the treatment, a synthetic enzyme code-named KXC79, is adjusted in response to each set of results. All the participants are volunteers and are assessed by my colleague Dr. Susan Minstock, using a number of standard evaluations (the Derogatis Sexual Functioning Inventory, the Locke-Wallace Marital Adjustment Test, the Female Sexual Function Index, etc.), before a decision is made as to whether they are suitable for inclusion. It is always explained to the volunteers exactly what the study will involve; to date, thirty-one potential subjects have declined to take part after these initial conversations. Nevertheless, early results have been encouraging; see, for example, S. J. Fisher and S. Minstock, “KXC79 and Female Sexual Dysfunction: Some Encouraging Early Results” (2007).
Miss G. was slightly unusual in that she was a postgraduate student here at the university who heard about the project from one of our research assistants.1 Strictly speaking, this was a breach of our selection protocol. However, Miss G. worked in a completely different field, English literature, and in all other respects fulfilled our criteria: she was anorgasmic and had previously consulted a doctor “to make sure it wasn’t just a virus.” Notes were kept from initial and subsequent interviews. She had also experienced relationship problems:
It wasn’t just that I couldn’t have orgasms—it was the fact that sex was such a big part of his life, and I couldn’t share that. I simply had no interest in it. Almost as if I were going out with a football fan, but was bored by sports.
Based on this discussion and the questionnaires, Dr. Minstock made a tentative diagnosis of Hypoactive Arousal Disorder and accepted her onto the study.
I myself met Miss G. for the first time when she came to the lab for her induction. As this meeting, apparently so ordinary, was in some ways the beginning of the whole sorry fiasco, I suppose I should pause at this point to note my initial impressions of her—as a person, I mean. The truth, though, is that I did not really have any. If I may be allowed a small subjective observation, what I recall most is being somewhat annoyed that she was there at all: my understanding was that the data-collection phase of our study was completed, at least for the time being, whilst I prepared our latest findings for publication. It was work that required a great deal of concentration, and when Dr. Minstock showed someone into the lab I did not, at first, look up from my computer.
“This is where the hands-on part happens,” my colleague was saying. “Well, when I say hands-on, of course, I don’t necessarily mean that literally—we’ve got toys to suit every taste.”
Needless to say, I did not respond to this either. Dr. Minstock’s jocular manner, which she frequently assures me is simply a psychological stratagem to put test subjects and co-workers at their ease, on occasion strays—it seems to me—into flippancy. Great scientists from the past—men such as James Watson and Francis Crick, say, when they were engaged in their revolutionary work on DNA—never felt the need to be flippant. But Dr. Minstock, as a sexologist, does not always have quite the same regard for scientific method that I do.
“That’s Dr. Fisher, who’s in charge of the biochemical side,” she added in a deafening whisper. “Don’t worry, we won’t disturb him if we’re quiet. Over here’s the photoplethagraph: basically it’s like a little light we pop inside so we can see what’s going on—”
“Photoplethysmograph,” I said, still without raising my head.
“What?”
“That is a photoplethysmograph, not a photoplethagraph. It calibrates reflected light. The darker the flush, the greater the vasodilation.”
“Oh, yes,” Dr. Minstock said brightly. “Photoplethysmograph. Of course.”
“What’s ‘vasodilation’?”
I did look up then. There was something about the voice that had just spoken—something wry, ironic even, as if the speaker were somehow mocking herself for not knowing the answer.
Or—it occurred to me a fraction of a second later—as if she were somehow mocking me for knowing it.
In short, I thought I had discerned in the way the visitor had spoken a spark of real intelligence, an impression only partially dispelled by her appearance. I did not at that point know Miss G. was an arts graduate, but I could probably have deduced it. She was attractive, strikingly so—I might as well make that clear at the outset. But she was striking, if this makes sense, in an entirely unremarkable way. A pleasant face, torn jeans, a cashmere pullover, a book bag, a knitted cap—and, spilling out from under the cap, a fine mass of chestnut-brown hair, as squeaky-clean and glossy as a freshly peeled conker. One could imagine that if one were to touch it, the hair would be expensive and soft, just like the sweater. Clearly, she was not part of the university I inhabit, bounded as it is by the Rutherford Laboratory on one side and the Science Park on the other. Hers was another Oxford entirely, a city of drama societies and college balls and open-top sports cars roaring off for meals in country pubs. In that Oxford, which overlaps mine whilst barely impinging upon it, girls like her are … I almost want to say “two-a-penny,” but of course they are considerably more expensive than that: their cashmere pullovers, their poise, and even their places at Oxford are the products of costly private educations.
So I glanced at Miss G. and immediately thought that I knew her type, a type which was both as familiar and as alien to me as if she were a member of another species.
In this, as it later turned out, I was quite wrong.
“Vasodilation,” I said, “relates to blood flow. Specifically, engorgement of the surface capillaries due to physiological stimulation.”
“Anything you want to know about the technical stuff, Steve’s your boy,” Dr. Minstock said, with a little roll of the eyes which was clearly meant to convey that knowing about the technical stuff was a long way down her own list of priorities.
“Actually,” Miss G. said, “there was one other thing—”
“I just need to check that file,” my colleague said quickly. “I’ll only be a few minutes.” As she left it seemed to me that she gave the other woman a pitying look, as if to say “I warned you.”
I sighed as I turned back to the visitor. “What did you want to know?”
“I was just wondering,” Miss G. said hesitantly, “if your treatment is something like Viagra.”
I regret to say that even before she had finished this sentence I was smiling slightly at its naivetÉ. “Not in the least, no. Viagra would be completely the wrong approach for any problem you might have.”
“Why’s that?”
“Well, I can tell you if you like,” I said. “But I very much doubt you’ll be able to grasp the answer.”
She looked at me then in a rather level way, and I thought I detected a slight tightening of her jaw.
“Try me,” she said.
My explanation will undoubtedly seem rather simplistic to my present audience, but for the sake of establishing exactly what I said to Miss G., I will repeat it here. “The active ingredient in sildenafil citrate, or Viagra, is a specific inhibitor of phosphodiesterase 5,” I pointed out. “This cleaves the ring form of cyclic GMP, a cellular messenger very similar to cAMP. The inhibition of the phosphodiesterase thus allows for the persistence of cGMP, which in turn promotes the release of nitric oxide into the corpus cavernosa of the penis.”
She nodded slowly. “You’re quite right.”
“Of course. The mechanism is relatively well understood.” I turned back to my laptop.
“No, I meant you’re right that I didn’t understand. Not a word. Mind you,” she went on, almost to herself, “it’s got a sort of music to it, hasn’t it, and I don’t always understand a piece of Tennyson or Keats when I first hear it either. Sometimes you have to sort of … feel the meaning before you can work out the details. Let’s see … so what you’re saying is that once the phospho thingy, the phosphodiesterase, is taken out of the equation, and the cyclic GMP does its stuff, it’s basically a question of nitric oxide, which must be a gas, so it’s really just about hydraulics.”
I must admit, I was quite surprised that she had managed to work out the gist of what I was saying from so little actual knowledge. “Approximately, yes. Women’s sexual responses are rather more complicated.”
“Ah. Now there, perhaps, I can correct you. You mean ‘complex.’”
I frowned. “It’s the same thing, surely.”
She shook her head. “‘Complicated’ means something difficult but ultimately knowable. ‘Complex’ implies something which has so many variables and unknowns it can only be appreciated intuitively—something beyond the reach of rational analysis, like poetry or literature or love.” And then, somewhat to my surprise, she recited what I took to be some lines of verse:
“When two are stripped, long ere the course begin
We wish that one should lose, the other win.
And one especially do we affect
Of two ...
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Hilarious romance of the geeks.,
This review is from: Chemistry for Beginners (Paperback)
I'm not a scientist but neither is the author of this book, so we did well together. Anthony Strong, I discovered, is actually Anthony Capella (THE WEDDING OFFICER, THE FOOD OF LOVE, etc.) who had this crazy idea for a quirky love story in the world of science but his publishers said it didn't fit his niche (love in the world of food) so he had to publish this one under the pseudonym Anthony Strong.This book is laugh-out-loud funny. The protagonist is a brilliant biochemist who knows almost everything about the science of sex, arousal and orgasm but next to nothing about love and romance and falls for one of his test subjects. Think of him as kind of like TV's Sheldon from "The Big Bang Theory" but better looking and slightly less clueless. The footnotes, illustrations and photographs in the book are genuine (and interesting even) with the exception of those footnotes towards the end which are merely the reactions of the protagonist to certain things he is reading in a coworker's journal. You can google names of scientists and papers mentioned and see for yourself. It's just that a romance with footnotes is hilarious. I have not laughed so much while reading a book since I can't remember when. And the section where the two romantic interests read and discuss D.H. Lawrence's LADY CHATTERLEY'S LOVER is hysterical. Not to mention the part where our biochemist goes online to Professor Pickup to get dating tips. Ridiculously funny. Do try this book. I think you'll like it a lot.
2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Geeky love story,
By Jenn D (Cambridge, MA United States) - See all my reviews
This review is from: Chemistry for Beginners (Paperback)
Okay, I loved this book. I thought it was fantastic.you know those books that cater to the nerdy crowd? you know, the ones that use science jokes that are only funny because you actually understand. and the mannerisms of brainiacs that are only so funny because you recognize all the people you went to school with in them? And the excessive use of footnotes, akin to a "good omens" style. and of course...a really technical look at the female orgasm. with diagrams. this book was a real treat, and i would recommend it to anyone who likes a good nerdy love story.
1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
A diverting romantic comedy that nearly transcends its obvious and shelf-worn elements,
By
This review is from: Chemistry for Beginners (Paperback)
What is science fiction? Chemistry for Beginners is not a novel most of us would fit under that umbrella, even though it's all about working scientists doing cutting-edge research on the frontiers of biological science in what may be the very near future. But that research is into female sexual response -- Female Sexual Dysfunction, to be even more clinical about it -- and Chemistry for Beginners turns out to be a romantic comedy in the end. (Though it's more Shakespearean in both its romance and comedy than the usual slapsticky modern style.)So not even the fact that it's written in the form of a scientific paper -- with footnotes and references at the end and everything -- can save it from the taint of un-seriousness and girlyness. SF is about Big Men doing Big Things: shiny phallic rockets thrusting into the void and penetrating alien worlds, giant machines probing deeply into the inner recesses of the universe, wars and fighting and death. Getting an anorgasmic woman to achieve bliss is much too yonic for the True World of Skiffy. Strong's hero is Dr. Steven J. Fisher, a brilliant young biochemist at Oxford working on a chemical treatment for FSD as head of a team comprising the usual hot-to-trot female sexologist and bevvy of young and eager post-docs. (Eager for each other in particular, as the reader learns bit by bit as Chemistry for Beginners goes on.) Strong has a weakness for the cliche in his characters; Fisher is implausibly innocent for a researcher into sex, and fits far too closely the typical media stereotype of the science nerd. He is our first person narrator, so we get inside his head, the better to learn how carefully organized, disciplined and regimented it really is. We're told that Steven is brilliant, but he never exhibits the quirky, random interests that the truly brilliant acquire; he's focused entirely on his work to an unlikely degree. The other half of the sexual equation is provided by Ms. G. (Annie Gluck), a late addition to the study. She's goaded into it by her thesis advisor/boyfriend -- she's reading for a doctorate in English -- who gotten annoyed by her lack of response. She's attracted to Steven almost immediately, but denies it for a very long time; we read her locked blog entries interspersed throughout Chemistry for Beginners, so we can see that she's lying to herself as well. Strong isn't quite as clear about the results of the study -- since Annie is lying about it, and Steven is, of course, clueless -- but it seems as if she's quickly become orgasmic because of the sound of Steven's voice during the treatments, but lies about it for personal emotional reasons that never become entirely clear. Steven and his team are preparing a major paper on his treatment, KXC79, which will be a showpiece of a major conference presented by Trock Pharmaceuticals, the sponsor of his research. Steven is working hard, in the way that only monomaniacal fictional scientists can, to iron out the last few discrepancies -- which are nearly all relating to Annie's continued lying to him and the other researchers about the orgasms that their test equipment keeps recording her as having. Chemistry doesn't turn into anything like a conventional romance until very near the end, since Annie is trying to deny her feelings for Steven and he's written to be as obtuse as a 179-degree angle. Strong does maneuver them into a position where it makes sense for them to have sex for the good of the experiment, but never plays up the comedy as much as he could. And, in the end, Chemistry does rely heavily on the expected morals and endings -- there are betrayals, but True Love cannot be defeated, and that nasty reductionist science-y stuff is swept away by feeling. It's a pleasant novel that doesn't aim all that high: it wants to be an amusing novel with some romantic and comedic elements without ever committing to being either a comedy or a romance. Strong is witty, and makes up in novelty and cultural references what he leaves out in gripping plotting. (There is a flurry of plot near the end, to set up the required confrontations and reverses, but most of the book is an amble through a few months of these people's lives.) Chemistry finally is neither a SF novel nor a romance, and is closest to a chick-lit book, with its clueless protagonist documenting everything happening to him. If Dr. Fisher had been actually as smart as he's supposed to be, Chemistry for Beginners could have really been something. But, as it is, its a decent diversion, with characters that came too directly from Central Casting to be entirely believable.
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