As a third-year Ph.D. candidate, Olive Smith doesn’t believe in lasting romantic relationships—but her best friend does, and that’s what got her into this situation. Convincing Anh that Olive is dating and well on her way to a happily ever after was always going to take more than hand-wavy Jedi mind tricks: Scientists require proof. So, like any self-respecting biologist, Olive panics and kisses the first man she sees.
That man is none other than Adam Carlsen, a young hotshot professor—and well-known ass. Which is why Olive is positively floored when Stanford’s reigning lab tyrant agrees to keep her charade a secret and be her fake boyfriend. But when a big science conference goes haywire, putting Olive’s career on the Bunsen burner, Adam surprises her again with his unyielding support and even more unyielding…six-pack abs.
Suddenly their little experiment feels dangerously close to combustion. And Olive discovers that the only thing more complicated than a hypothesis on love is putting her own heart under the microscope.
I knew I was going to read The Love Hypothesis sooner rather than later when I saw that the movie had finally been released on Prime. Having read Love, Theoretically a couple of months ago (yes, out of order – whoops) I knew I was going to enjoy the book. What I hadn’t planned on was the book not being able to leave my head once the movie went live on Prime. Now, I haven’t watched it, yet, but ever since it went live, I kept thinking about the book and how I needed to read it as soon as possible so that I could then, in turn, watch the movie. So when I started to feel like I needed to read something with light-hearted romance and fun, I knew that I was going to start The Love Hypothesis.
Once I started, Hazelwood’s writing style had me hooked. Like Emily Henry and Abby Jimenez, Hazelwood has quickly become a favorite Rom Com author. She has basically become a staple and I especially love the Women in Stem genre she has contributed to. Although, I will say that it had had me rethink becoming a professor because of how thankless academia seems to be. But that is a digression for another time. Hazelwood had me sat and while it took my attention span several days to get focused (I have been sick the past couple of weeks and when I am sick my attention span is trash) every time I stopped reading the book, I would continue to think about it, excited to read the rest despite knowing how it would turn out.
Hazelwood creates such fun characters and has a great ability at bringing warm, light-hearted banter to the characters – two of my favorite things in a Rom Com. And the fact that it basically fourth-walled itself the whole time was fantastic. It made me feel like I was in on the joke instead of merely watching the novel unfold before me. I loved it. And don’t get me started on Olive’s nickname from one of her best friends – the fact that he calls her Kalamata is just TOO cute to me. That alone would have won me over. I love clever nicknames.
Olive and Adam’s relationship – both the fake one and the real friendship they cultivated as they perpetuated the fake dating (not a spoiler, it’s in the blurb) was precious to me. I love the grumpy/sunshine trope way more than I expected to, as it turns out. Throw in a little “Touch her and die” and I’m sold – and I say that as a full-fledged feminist. All that to say, I really enjoyed how Hazelwood wrote the story. I feel like doing something like a fake-dating trope can be difficult because it is well-played out already. So Hazelwood doing it in a fun, quirky way, with an academic backdrop, really appealed to me and doesn’t make it feel like a trite, overdone trope. Plus, the way they progressed as a fake couple and how they handled it behind the scenes was cute and believable. And made for some fantastic banter.
I really enjoyed my second Hazelwood book and look forward to reading more from her. I will definitely be watching the movie soon (as in, shortly after finishing this review) and seeing how I like the adaptation. I will be sure to post the review for that as well. If you enjoy Rom Coms in an academic setting, great banter and fun characters, or if you are a fan of the fake-dating trope, I would definitely check The Love Hypothesis out.
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