“I met Charlie Fish in Chicago in the fall of 1943. First I dismissed him, then I liked him, then I ruined him, then I saved him. In return he taught me what love was, lust, too, and above all what it is like to have a powerful conscience.”
All it took for me to want to read Universe of Two were those opening sentences, so beautifully written by author Stephen P. Kiernan. This book resonated with me from the beginning. My parents also met during World War II in Chicago, but their’s was a completely different love story.
Charlie Fish was a brilliant mathematician and Harvard graduate. He was working at the Metallurgic Lab at the University of Chicago for the war effort calculating mathematical arcs. He stopped into Dubie’s Music in Hyde Park where he met the owner’s daughter, sassy Brenda. Brenda had been set to study organ at Oberlin Conservatory of Music in Ohio, but her education was put on hold due to the war. Both her father and brother were away due to the war, so Brenda and her mother were running the store.
Brenda tells their love story as an older woman looking back on her life. Her part of the book is written in first person. The chapters alternate between Brenda and Charlie, with Charlie’s story written in third person. I loved the way the book was written, and I could hardly put it down!
Eventually, Charlie is transferred to New Mexico to work with the Manhattan Project. All of the men worked on various parts of the project. This “compartmentalization” was purposefully done so that no one knew the entirety of the project. When it becomes clear to Charlie and the other men what they are doing, their values of right and wrong are tested to the highest degree.
There are so many touching scenes in the book. Brenda reminisces about sitting on her basement steps while her father was soldering. I thought back to holding tools for my dad while he worked on our heater in the basement. When Brenda would list the casualties of the Japanese in the Pacific, I thought of my mom telling me that she lost her brother near the end of the war on a destroyer in the Pacific that was hit by Japanese kamikaze planes. When Brenda goes to New Mexico to be near Charlie, she works for a minister and his wife playing the organ. The wife is not friendly at all to Brenda, and we eventually find out why. When D-Day was mentioned in the book, I thought of my father’s loss of his oldest nephew, a medic with the US Army, on that day. Universe of Two touches on the sacrifice that all American families were making during that time. Everyone is so anxious for the war to end so things will get back to normal. But does it?
Charlie and Brenda work hard to normalize their lives after the war. They are so committed to each other and work together to heal their hearts.
Universe of Two was impeccably researched. The author’s acknowledgements at the end of the book go into detail about the writing of the book, and I don’t want to spoil that for you. The author has a playlist on Spotify titled Universe of Two that is full of music that goes along with various aspects of the book (classical, blues, square dance, and wartime). The photo below has a copy of Chopin’s Nocturne in E flat major, Op. 9, No. 2, which Brenda played for Charlie on the day they met. It also has vintage 1940’s Chicago postcards that Brenda could have used to write to Charlie when he was in New Mexico. I found out about Universe of Two when the author was featured on Spivey’s Book Club. I also learned that he and I were the only ones who liked Milky Way candy bars!
I highly recommend that you pick up a copy of Universe of Two from your local bookstore!
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️/5
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