Good. Set in the cold War in America it is a rollercoaster of book as it is full of subterfuge and spies with a spot of romance. Also it questions the morality of the atomic bomb and its effect on people who made it.

FAscinating story about women's role in science and the race to build the bomb. We are taken to the heart of the Manhattan project and the cold war. There's russian spies, FBI agents and tales of Japanese prisoners. The novel is filled with science and it's easy to understand and follow. Fascinating world and say that coming from a very non scientific background! Full characters you care about and a very interesting story. A must read!

Cheesy title aside this is a great espionage book! Aside from spying it touches on lesser wrote about aspects of WW2, such as POW's in Japan and the release of the atomic bomb, and how people lived with the consequences. It also dips into gender inequalities after the war. I found it a bit slow at the start as I didn't initially like the writing style but by about 20% in or so I was hooked. It didn't take me long to read as I was keen to find out how Rosalind would get on in her mission and if she could betray the man she loved. It's a shame the book started in after the war as I think it would have been interesting to see Rosalind and Weaver during the war, maybe there could be a prequel?!

Rosalind Porter, 30, is an extremely clever young woman, so much so that she works on the Manhattan Project with Enrico Fermi. She has a love affair with British scientist Thomas Wheeler who ultimately lets her down and gets her sacked from the work she loves. Why? It is now 1950 and she’s working at Marshall Fields in Chicago retailing antique jewellery. She’s becomes aware she’s being followed though he’s not very good partly because he’s so darned tall! This proves to be FBI Agent Charlie Szydlo who tells her a startling story about Wheeler ......The story is told from the perspectives of Charlie and Roz.

I absolutely love this book. First of all, any writer who can make science (especially physics 🤦🏼‍♀️) interesting to a dunce like me probably deserves an award! It’s so well written, at times it’s very colourful, at others very mysteriously cloak and dagger but it grips from start to finish. The depiction of the post war period with the growing freeze of the Cold War and massive concerns now that Russia had the A-Bomb and want the H-Bomb, The ‘reds under the bed’ of McCarthyism is really well done. The author also shows the changing role of women and how some want more than the traditional roles assigned. The characterisation is excellent, there are some lovely characters you can invest time in. There’s obviously Roz and Charlie and their respective families and though you don’t know what to make of Wheeler, he’s not dull! There’s real intensity in some of the encounters between Roz and Wheeler and Roz and Charlie that you feel like an intrusive eavesdropper so you hardly dare to breathe. Charlie’s revelations to Roz of his experiences as a Japanese prisoner of war are profoundly moving and you can feel the growing emotional charge between them. I love the Russian spy element and the perceived and actual danger is very intriguing with the plot containing betrayal, secrets and lies.

Overall, in my opinion this is a first class historical thriller of many depths which is so good I didn’t want the book to end and it’s one I recommend.

With thanks to Penguin Michael Joseph for the ARC.

Atomic Love by Jennie Fields is a historical novel set in 1950’s Chicago just after the second world war. Rosalind Porter is a physicist was involved in the Manhattan Project the development of the atom bomb; she is feeling guilty for all the people that died because of it. Her Lover Thomas Wheeler is also with the project. But he leaves her and makes her lose her job at the project.
Years later she sells jewelery at a department store. Far cry from the scientist she used to be. When she meets Thomas Wheeler again and with that an FBI agent Charlie Szydio, who thinks that Wheeler is selling secrets to the Russians and wants Rosalind to help him prove it. But meeting Wheeler brings up the memories of the past and her love for him.
Thank you, Penguin Michael Joseph, for a copy of Atomic Love. Historical fiction is one of my favorite genres. But for me personally this book wasn’t for me. I was expecting a gripping story of spies and espionage but, this is more a romance novel. I was seriously going to DNF this 20% in, but I thought I would preserve and give it the benefit of the doubt but for me it didn’t improve. Don’t get me wrong there is lots of positive reviews. I just thought it was a bit flat. I was waiting for something big to happen and unfortunately it did not. Just Rosalind couldn’t decide what man she wanted. Which I’m sorry too cheesy for me and I found Rosalind irritating.

This novel has many strands: espionage; nuclear science; war; moral decisions; romance and betrayal. Set in Chicago in 1950 this is primarily the story of Rosalind Porter, one of very few female scientists who worked on the Manhattan Project, the development of the nuclear bomb. Her lover, Thomas Weaver is also a scientist on the project. Rosalind’s world begins to fall apart after the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, which broke her heart, Weaver inexplicably leaving her and her sacking from her job. She now works in a tedious sales job. How Rosalind deals with all the issues is at the heart of the book.

After a few years Weaver reappears in her life, closely followed by FBI agent Charlie Szydlo who has reason to believe that Weaver has been working for the Russians and wants Rosalind’s help to prove this. Rosalind is torn between rekindling her relationship with Weaver, her loyalty to her country and her growing attraction to Szydlo.

This is not a traditional romantic story nor is it a conventional spy thriller. It is much more about people, their relationships and the decisions they make. It is really well written, the descriptions of Chicago in a hot summer are particularly evocative. The characters are very well drawn, full of flaws, guilt and indecision. It is also an important examination of the role of women in the 1950s and the challenges and bias they had to face.
I really enjoyed reading Atomic Love and I would recommend it highly.

Thank you to NetGalley and Michael Joseph Books for an ARC in exchange for an honest review.

All the best ingredients for a thrilling read – spies, the FBI, a powerful female conquering a male environment, and some romance…

In 1950s Chicago, Rosalind is working behind a jewellery counter, having put her work on the bomb behind her and plodding along in a more conventional life; however, enter Agent Szydlo from the FBI who wants Rosalind to meet with an old lover, and to find out information.

The characters in this novel are bold and brave, feisty and very vivid; the narrative flows strongly and draws you along through the story so that you can’t jump off. A great read, I really enjoyed it.

A Mystery of Spies. As a young scientist, Rosalind Porter helped split the atom. This helped to create atomic bombs, a fact that she always regretted even though it helped end WWII. Wheeler was her lover. Charlie Szydlo is the FBI agent who asks her to entrap him, believing him to be a Russian spy. This is their story. Strong, believable characters and an absorbing plot make this a good read, if a bit slow at times.

Brilliant book, I couldn’t put it down. The ending wasn’t entirely suitable, in my opinion, even if I understand why it was written like this, and the only reason it didn’t make it to 5 stars. Brilliant characters, excellent story telling and ideas. I will definitely read more by this author.

would like to thank netgalley and the publisher for letting me read this book

a woman scientist helped split the atom and then to her disgust it was used in the bombs of japan helping to end the war...she was devastated with her part in it, but the betrayal of her boyfriend who dumped and married someone else turned her life upside down

years later with her job in a shop her old boyfriend turns up and tries to sweep her off her feet...

but the fbi are on his tail and they reveal some truths that are hard to follow

a fascinating storyline based after the war and how the russians tried to infiltrate the usa...and tried to get as many secrets as they could..using rosalind as much as they can

I found this to be a thoroughly enjoyable read. It is a light read, a romantic spy novel. The story which is set after WW2 and the spy element relates to the Manhattan project.. I am not a lover of romantic fiction, quite happy to have the romance but want more from the book than that. This book does deliver a little more. It touches on the prejudice women scientists faced at that time and, from that perspective the portrayal of gender roles is interesting. I liked the characters and found the main characters interesting. However, for this book to receive fives stars from me I would want this theme developed more. Equally the spy element is a little stereotypical. However, I sat in the sunshine and read the book through in just about one day and enjoyed reading it.

I didn't chose this book - it was offered to me - and i wasn't sure it was my thing - but I thoroughly enjoyed it and found it to be a good read. Definitely not my normal category and a bit too romantic for my liking but overall it was a well written,interesting story. Recommended.

Atomic Love is an intriguing historical romance, a personable, female-fronted take on espionage in the Cold War era.

On the whole, I found the characters realistic and engaging, all coming to terms with different kinds of guilt and trauma. Fields touches on many different issues of post-WWII society without ever making it too didactic or dry. The writing is sound, if a little slow-paced. However, I was disappointed by the romance - in the end, I felt it detracted from some of the individual character development by tying up all the loose ends all too quickly.

Atomic Love is an engaging story - one for those who like their historical fiction imbued with a bit of romance.

‘Atomic Love’ by Jennie Fields is set in Chicago in 1950 and focuses on Rosalind, reduced to working in a department store, having been dismissed from her previous scientific work because she is viewed as unstable. The reader soon understands that this is far from the truth. Rosalind does become very depressed after Hiroshima and Nagasaki, knowing that her work on the atomic bomb helped to facilitate these tragedies. However, she is anything other than incapable.
Badly let down by former lover Wheeler, she is shocked when he inveigles his way back into her life and even more taken aback when she is contacted by FBI Agent Charlie Szydlo who asks Rosalind to spy on Wheeler, suspected of selling atomic secrets to Russia.
Fields weaves so many important themes into this story. The reader has a real sense of the frustration felt by women once WWII is over. Those formerly fulfilled through important war work are asked to move over for the men and domesticity appears to be the only way forward. Through Charlie, the author also imagines just how difficult it is for those men who have been physically and mentally injured in the war to fully return to civilian life. The flashbacks to the Japanese prison camps remind the reader of the suffering endured. Back in the US, a different kind of war is being fought; the fear of Communism is an ever-present political reality.
The love story of Wheeler and Rosalind and the developing relationship between the latter and Szydlo drive the narrative, as the title suggests. However, the descriptions of the building emotions and the physical moments are amongst the least successful sections of the novel. Fields’ use of clichés is surprising given that she is clearly a talented writer; it is in these moments that the novel feels more like a lightweight read rather than a serious exploration of complicated lives in a complicated time. Nevertheless, she is brave enough to allow a more nuanced ending to her story.
My thanks to NetGalley and Penguin Michael Joseph UK for a copy of this novel in exchange for a fair review.

The story surrounds Rosalind Porter a physicist who was involved in the Manhattan Project. I’ll be honest I have never heard of the Manhattan Project and most of the way through the book I just thought it was fictional. It was only when reading others’ reviews of the book that I realised this was a real thing, and Googled it to find out more. The Manhattan Project was an R & D project which developed the atom bomb used in Hiroshima, Japan, towards the end of the second world war. It’s said that the bomb ended the war.

Rosalind’s interest lay in nuclear energy. It was never her intention to develop a bomb that would kill and maim thousands of people, and she finds it difficult to live with the guilt that she became a part of that in her career. Thanks in part to her ex boyfriend and lover Thomas Wheeler her career is over and five years later she now works on the sales counter of an antique jewellers.

Though in part this is a story of espionage and has elements of a thriller, it is in the main a love story. A story of divided loyalties. Whilst Wheeler may have been her greatest love, can she still trust him after the way he abandoned her with no explanation. Then there’s Charlie Szydlo the FBI agent who has asked her to spy on Wheeler and find out what information he may have passed to Russia. Wheeler may have betrayed Roz and lost her a promising career but does she now hate him enough to betray him or are her feelings for him being rekindled now he’s turned up and back in her life.

Threaded through the story is Roz’s relationship with her sister Louisa and her family. Even though Louisa and her husband brought up Roz and welcomed her into their family, her and her sister have never been close. There is also the backstory of Charlie Szydlo the FBI agent, previously a prisoner of war in Japan. He has a harrowing story to tell. As Roz becomes more involved with Charlie, she finds herself falling for his attentive and caring ways, something she never experienced with Wheeler.

So this is much more a story of people and their relationships with each other than a traditional spy thriller. I really enjoyed it. It’s something a little different and you’ll find yourself rooting for all the characters in the book. They all have a story to tell, deep sadness and regret, hurts that need to heal. You might even find yourself feeling just a little sorry for Thomas Wheeler – the villain of the piece? Or a misguided fool who has lived to regret his choices. I still couldn’t decide on that one, even at the end of the book.

It’s a compelling read and one which I happily give 5 stars to.

Set in Chicago in 1950 not long after the Second World War (obviously) Rosalind is still feeling guilty about her work in the creation of the nuclear bomb that maimed and kill so many. She is also still not over the rejection of her lover who not only dumped her but also got her fired from the job she loved, which is also the one that helped create the bomb so strange emotions all around.
But don't think this is a dreary read or anything like that, it's a thriller that thrills but also a love story or two. The characters are well crafted and fitting for the era of how imagen they would be.
I'm not the greatest of romance story reads but there is a lot more to this than a love story which is why I gave it 5 stars the suspense the plot twists and red herrings leave you desperate to read the next page leaving you wondering what happened to the last few hours when you realise you've been reading far longer than intended.
So yes I highly recommend this wonderful book and hope you enjoy it I did and think you will as well. But you need to read it to see if I'm right or wrong.

Atomic Love is superb. A clever intersection of character driven historical spy fiction with science and delicate relationships. It meets a lots of expectations and tackles issues which were highly relevant in the 1950s and are perhaps even more relevant today; woman in science.

It moves along with incredible pace but maintains a grounded realism throughout. With plenty of intrigue and red herrings to keep you guessing, this one will keep you up and guessing into the night.

With thanks to Netgalley and Penguin Random House for an ARC in consideration of an honest review.

I really enjoyed this! The writing was evocative of the 50s and I felt absolutely engaged with the story. The story revolves around 3 main characters and the reader is urgently wanting one of the relationships to succeed. Care and gentleness contrast with the awfulness in the history of the main characters and the USA involvement in the Second World War.
Absolutely recommended.

This was more of a torn-between-two-lovers romance than I expected from the blurb. There are some atmospheric touches that think about the ethics of the Manhattan Project and some harrowing scenes in a Japanese PoW camp that feel a bit out of place. But most of the book is a rather cheesy romance where her skin smells of honey, and he smells spicy and masculine ;) There's more soap opera filler, too, as the main couple's families have their own issues. The spy story is rather superficial and has a kind of old-fashioned feel that is not out of place in the late 40s setting. Perfect for when you want something unchallenging but interesting as switch-off reading.

Atomic Love is a literary thriller, based in the '50s, about a young woman, Rosalind, a scientist, whose livelihood is left in tatters after the bomb in Hiroshima. Having been involved in the Manhatten project, and the development of the Atomic Bomb, she is scarred with the guilt of all those lost lives, and to top it off, she lost her love , who sold her under the river, and disappeared,
A few years later, she is working a simple job in a department store, when he comes back, to rekindle love, or to wreak havoc again?
Enter an FBI agent scarred from his own battles in the war, who needs her help.
What follows is a story filled with emotion and twists, as Rosalind's life is turned upside down.
Will she turn to her ex-lover, and help him with his troubles, or will she succumb to the feelings that are developing for a certain FBI agent?
This isn't my usual genre to read, but I thoroughly enjoyed the story, and found myself willing my eyes to stay awake to finish the book.
Many thanks to NetGalley and Penguin Michael Joseph UK for an Arc, in exchange for an honest review.