With regard to Penrose, I recommend the two books - Emperor's New Mind and Shadows of the Mind in that order. I also recommend reading his critics and Penrose's response to them, such as the source of the quote.
The math can be tedious, but I'm sure you'll be looking for the underlying flow - and that's where Penrose is particularly engaging IMHO.
A-G, P, I've been thinking that one of the things QM has succeeded in doing is exploding the "myth" of matter. (Bye-bye materialism.) I'm no expert in this field for sure, but it's beginning to look to me that, bottom line, all there is (really) is energy in different states. I'm speculating that there may be a relation to consciousness itself here.... So maybe, in the end, atoms are indeed "conscious" in a way we do not yet understand. But then, we really don't much understand what consciousness in general even is yet.
Just a curious thought for further investigation and meditation....
Thank you again! With hugs to you both!