One of the librarians’ Shout & Share picks from BEA, A Fierce Radiance, was featured on NPR’s All Things Considered yesterday. In the novel, author Lauren Belfer tells the true story of the development of penicillin, featuring a fictional Life magazine photographer on assignment to cover the story. Belfer says she read every issue of Life magazine from 1939 to 1945 to get a feel for the time.

The book has been garnering strong reviews;

NYT Book Review, Pharma Drama, Maggie Scharf, “[Belfer] knows how to turn esoteric information into an adventure story, and how to tell that story very well.”

Chicago Tribune, Review by Celia McGee, “… who can’t be grateful for a long, interesting, if over-full, historical novel that isn’t about vampires?”

USA Today, War, love and loss burst from Lauren Belfer’s ‘Radiance’, Erik Brady, “…A Fierce Radiance, a genre-blending historical novel, is love story and murder mystery rolled into panoramic family saga and industrial-espionage thriller.”

A Fierce Radiance Lauren Belfer Retail Price: $25.99 Hardcover: 544 pages Publisher: Harper – (2010-06-01) ISBN / EAN: 0061252514 / 9780061252518

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