Der Name Rosalind Franklin sagte mir nichts, aber der Klappentext zu diesem Buch war so interessant, dass ich diesen Roman unbedingt lesen musste.
Rosalind hat sich der Wissenschaft verschrieben und nichts hat sie je davon abgehalten. Schon früh war sie der Meinung, dass eine Beziehung ihr nur im Weg stehen würde und doch entwickelte auch sie Gefühle. Das hat sie aber nicht abgehalten von ihren Forschungen, sondern eher beflügelt. Selbst als Männer sich ihrer Ergebnisse bemächtigten, forschte sie weiter. Sie hat es nicht immer leicht gehabt. Ihre Familie stand zwar zu ihr, konnte aber auch nicht verstehen, dass sie diesen Weg gewählt hat.
Manchmal fand ich diesen Roman schwer zu lesen, gerade wenn es ins Fachliche ging. Aber dennoch hat mich die Geschichte von Anfang an gepackt.
Rosalind Franklin ist eine bewundernswerte Frau, die nie aufgegeben hat, selbst wenn das Leben ihr Steine zwischen die Füße warf. Erschreckend fand ich aber, wie leichtsinnig sie mit ihrem Leben gespielt hat, indem sie die Sicherheitsmaßnahmen einfach ignorierte. Wütend aber wurde ich, als sich ihre Kollegen ihre Forschungsergebnisse zu eigen machten. Aber in der damaligen Zeit war das wohl nichts Ungewöhnliches, denn an führenden Stellen gab es immer nur Männer und wir haben ja erlebt, wie schwer es überhaupt war, als Frau wissenschaftlich arbeiten zu können. Dass diese Männer dafür später den Nobelpreis bekamen und Rosalind nicht einmal erwähnt wurde, ist furchtbar.
Mir hat dieser Roman über eine wenig bekannte, aber geniale Wissenschaftlerin gut gefallen. ( )

Historical fiction based on the life of Rosalind Franklin, a scientist in post-World War II France and London who quickly becomes an expert in x-ray crystallography, a tool she uses to verify the helical structure of DNA and later RNA, which paves the way for antiviral vaccines. This well-researched novel suggests that it was Dr. Franklin’s research that Francis Crick, James Watson, and Maurice Wilkins used to form the basis of their Nobel Prize winning DNA modeling. Dr. Franklin’s painstaking methodical testing and gathering of data ultimately work against her in a race to take credit for her groundbreaking discoveries, a race she never wanted any part of. The writing was uneven in places, but the story was always compelling. ( )

Her Hidden Genius is a fictionalized partial biography about scientist Rosalind Franklin.  She did much of the research on the structure of DNA in the 1950s in England, only to have most of her work credited to James Watson, Francis Crick, and Maurice Wilkins (the latter an obnoxious co-worker of hers), who won the 1962 Nobel Prize for Medicine "for their discoveries concerning the molecular structure of nucleic acids and its significance for information transfer in living material."

I'm not particularly fond of Marie Benedict's style for her biographical novels - telling the story in first person and present tense.  Each chapter begins with a date (or dates) and location(s), but using present tense makes the chapters seem less like the journal entries such chapter headings might imply.  Although the book only covers the last 11 years of Franklin's too-short life, it's over 300 pages long, and feels repetitious at times. However, I do like that Benedict writes about little-known women whose accomplishments are often overshadowed by men - co-workers or spouses.  Franklin's story is particularly sad and frustrating.

A better source on Franklin is probably Rosalind Franklin and DNA, a biography by her friend, journalist Anne Sayre, which Benedict cites as one of her sources in her author's note. ( )

Short review for now: I sped read through the last 100 pages, so I could find out how the story concluded. My initial rating is 2.5 stars, rounded down to 2 stars. I might revise it later.

April 29, 2022 addition:

My reasons for giving this book a low rating are varied. I started out with the audio version. Although the narration was okay, I kept finding my mind wandering while listening. Since it was related to science I wanted to give the story a chance, so I borrowed the ebook. That choice allowed me to complete the story but I really wanted to DNF the book multiple times.

The main focus of the story is on Rosalind Franklin. When the story opens, we find her at the beginning of her career as a fledgling female scientist trying to forge a path within a male dominated field. As the events unfolded, I didn't really care for the writing or the characterization of a historical figure. The author uses a limited amount of scientific and French terms, over and over, which made the writing bland and repetitive. As for the partially fictionalized romantic and competitive aspects of to the story, I tried to have an open mind, as I imagine Dr. Franklin would have encountered some emotionally charged situations. The way the author chose to present this narrative, had an overly dramatic quality to it, which had an air of inauthenticity.

The most interesting and well written chapter in this book was the 'Author's Note.' As I suspected, the crux of the story revolves around egotistical men who did not giving the due credit to a talented female scientist or her research. Otherwise, I preferred reading the Wikipedia page on Rosalind Franklin and actually learned much more factual information through that source. Just to avoid any spoilers for potential readers, I won't say a lot more about her personal or professional story here.

For anyone interested in learning more about Rosalind Franklin's life, including her groundbreaking achievements in x-ray crystallography research, there is a biography by [a:Anne Sayre|205071|Anne Sayre|https://s.gr-assets.com/assets/nophoto/user/u_50x66-632230dc9882b4352d753eedf9396530.png] on the subject called [b:Rosalind Franklin and DNA|773101|Rosalind Franklin and DNA|Anne Sayre|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1347343375l/773101._SY75_.jpg|759152]. I have not read it myself, so I cannot comment on whether I'd recommend the book or not.

Who should read this book? Well, maybe devoted fans of Marie Benedict or those who aren't terribly nitpicky about how factual details are presented in biographical historical fiction stories. Some readers loved this book but I just didn't have the same reaction. ( )

Really enjoyed getting to know this piece of history. Would like to read other books by this author ( )