We are pleased to present the latest update of the Lab Lit List, our iconic database of fiction about scientists. This time around we have 26 regular novels, three plays and three novels in the ‘crossover’ category (i.e., hard science fiction with particularly good renderings of scientists) to add. As always, thanks to Dom for helping to find most of these – you can read more about his process in this companion article.
By popular demand we have also – finally – re-ordered the main list of novels alphabetically by surname. Sorry that it has taken so long.
This update coincides with our 20th anniversary edition. Elsewhere in these pages you can find our updated graph of lab lit, which charts the seemingly unstoppable rise of the genre from a trickle to a modest…flood is too strong a word, but over the past decade it’s averaged 16 books per year, whereas before the 1980s, it was one or two per year, and usually nothing at all. So this is another milestone to celebrate!
Something missing? If you know about a book that you think should be on the master list, please do let us know at editoral@lablit.com.
In the meantime, happy reading! All the new works are listed below.
NOVELS
The Only Woman in the Room
by Marie Benedict
Historical Drama: A fictionalized account of Hedy Lamarr, an actress who was also a scientist.
Links: Amazon (UK)
Her Hidden Genius
by Marie Benedict
Historical Drama: A fictionalized account of scientist Rosalind Franklin, in which she is obscured by her male colleagues and rivals.
Links: Amazon (UK)
Magnus
by Mark Carew
Thriller: Students and a professor clash while doing fieldwork on a small Norwegian island.
Links: Amazon (UK)
You Can’t Hurt Me
by Emma Cook
Thriller: Anna is working on the biography of charismatic neuroscientist Nate, but ends up uncovering his toxic secrets.
Links: Amazon (UK)
The Small Museum
by Jody Cooksley
Thriller: Newly married to a naturalist in the Victorian era, Madelaine is framed for a crime she did not commit.
Links: Amazon (UK)
A Guide to the Birds of East Africa
by Nicholas Drayson
Comedy/Lab lit lite: Two rivals for the affection of the East African Ornithological Society’s bird-walk leader agree on a competitive bird-watching contest.
Links: Amazon (UK)
Bonding
by Mariel Franklin
Thriller: Mary meets a brilliant young chemist working on an experimental drug claiming to cure the anxieties of modern life, but she soon discovers there are side-effects.
Links: Amazon (UK)
Speak
by Louisa Hall
Historical drama: An exploration of the creation of Artificial Intelligence, though five disparate characters over many years, including Alan Turing.
Links: Amazon (UK)
Not in Love
by Ali Hazelwood
Romance: A biotech engineer at a food science start-up falls for the man who is leading a hostile take-over of the business.
Links: Amazon (UK)
The Great Divide
by Christina Henriquez
Historical drama: An exploration of the construction of the Panama canal through the lives several people, including a scientist dedicated to eliminating malaria.
Links: Amazon (UK)
The Alternatives
by Caolinn Hughes
Drama: When a geologist disappears, her sisters track her down to a remote bungalow in rural Ireland, where they confront old wounds and diagnose new ills.
Links: Amazon (UK)
The Stars Turned Inside Out
by Nova Jacobs
Thriller/Lab lit lite: When a young physicist is discovered dead at CERN, an investigator uncovers petty rivalries and wonders what physics secrets are worth killing for.
Links: Amazon (UK)
The Health of Strangers (2017)
by Lesley Kelly
Thriller/lab lit lite: After a plague, a small Health Enforcement Team in Edinburgh has to keep the lid on a new influenza virus and track down some missing girls. (First of a series).
Links: Amazon (UK)
Daniel
by Henning Mankell
Historical Lab lit lite: In 1875, a young Swedish entomologist in the Kalahari ‘rescues’ a boy whose family was killed, but when he takes him back to Sweden, the boy faces all the prejudices of the age. Translated from Swedish.
Links: Amazon (UK)
A Sign of Her Own
by Sarah Marsh
Historical drama: Alexander Graham Bell betrays a deaf woman involved in the invention of the telephone.
Links: Amazon (UK)
The Naturalist
by Andrew Mayne
Thriller: A computational biologist uses science to investigate what he thinks is the murder of one of his students. (First of a series).
Links: Amazon (UK)
Whale Fall
by Elizabeth O’Connor
Historical Drama/Lab lit lite: When a dead whale washes up on a Welsh island, a young woman is drawn to two ethnographers studying island life.
Links: Amazon (UK)
Shear
by Tim Parks
Drama: An English geologist working on a Mediterranean island becomes entangled in a nightmare web of deceit, corruption, lust and tragedy.
Links: Amazon (UK)
Enlightenment
by Sarah Perry
Drama: Two men share an obsession with the vanished nineteenth-century female astronomer Maria Veduva.
Links: Amazon (UK)
Playground
by Richard Powers
Drama: In Polynesia, plans for floating cities bring four people together, including a marine biologist and an AI researcher.
Links: Amazon (UK)
Mr Einstein’s Secretary
by Matthew Reilly
Historical/Lab lit lite: Hanna Fischer wanted to study physics under Einstein, but her life is disrupted by the Second World War.
Links: Amazon (UK)
There Are Rivers in the Sky
by Elif Shafak
Historical Drama/Lab lit lite: A split timeline links different people in the past, from Ashurbanipal in Assyria to Victorian London, a Yazidi girl in ISIS-controlled Iraq, and a hydrologist in the present.
Links: Amazon (UK)
The Weeds
by Katy Simpson Smith
Historical Drama: Two women separated by time, but linked but their botanical work.
Links: Amazon (UK)
Pathways
by Katie Ward
Drama: A neuroscientist and her partner’s daughter struggle to form a relationship when the partner disappears.
Links: Amazon (UK)
One Perfect Couple
by Ruth Ware
Drama: Post-doc researcher Lyla joins a reality TV show, and things go horribly wrong.
Links: Amazon (UK)
The Distant Dead
by Heather Young
Thriller/Lab lit lite: When the body of a former mathematics professor is found burnt to death in a desert, social studies teacher Nora Wheaton investigates what happened.
Links: Amazon (UK)
CROSSOVER NOVELS
Venomous Lumpsucker
by Ned Beauman
Drama: In the 2030s, biobanks of lost organisms are cyber-attacked, wiping out the last traces of the perished species.
Links: Amazon (UK)
Ascension
by Nicholas Binge
Drama: When a mountain appears in the Pacific Ocean and a group of scientists is sent to investigate, explorer Harry Tunmore agrees to join the secret mission, for reasons beyond scientific curiosity.
Links: Amazon (UK)
Feed Them Silence
by Lee Mandelo
Drama: Using a neurological interface to translate her animal subject’s perception through her own mind, Dr. Sean Kell-Luddon realises a lifelong dream of being a wolf.
Links: Amazon (UK)
PLAYS
Dr Semmelweis
by Stephen Brown
Play: Drama about the real-life doctor who promoted hand washing to stop the spread of diseases.
Links: National Theatre
Farm Hall
by Katherine Moar
Play: German nuclear scientists deal with life in British captivity in 1945.
Links: Guardian
Test Room Eight
by Lester Powell
Radio play: Philip Odell and his assistant investigate suspected sabotage at a pharmaceutical plant.
Links: Internet Archive
