Love, Theoretically

"The reigning queen of STEM romance."—The Washington Post

An Indie Next and Library Reads Pick!

Rival physicists collide in a vortex of academic feuds and fake dating shenanigans in this delightfully STEMinist romcom from the New York Times bestselling author of The Love Hypothesis and Love on the Brain.

The many lives of theoretical physicist Elsie Hannaway have finally caught up with her. By day, she’s an adjunct professor, toiling away at grading labs and teaching thermodynamics in the hopes of landing tenure. By other day, Elsie makes up for her non-existent paycheck by offering her services as a fake girlfriend, tapping into her expertly honed people-pleasing skills to embody whichever version of herself the client needs.

Honestly, it’s a pretty sweet gig—until her carefully constructed Elsie-verse comes crashing down. Because Jack Smith, the annoyingly attractive and arrogant older brother of her favorite client, turns out to be the cold-hearted experimental physicist who ruined her mentor’s career and undermined the reputation of theorists everywhere. And he’s the same Jack Smith who rules over the physics department at MIT, standing right between Elsie and her dream job.

Elsie is prepared for an all-out war of scholarly sabotage but…those long, penetrating looks? Not having to be anything other than her true self when she’s with him? Will falling into an experimentalist’s orbit finally tempt her to put her most guarded theories on love into practice?

My Verdict

This book felt like all of Ali Hazelwood's novels for me. If you've enjoyed the first two books -- Love Hypothesis and Love on the Brain, you will enjoy this one too. They are easy reads and in the predictable genre of contemporary romance. I enjoy this type of read following a heavy read, and after finishing Demon Copperhead, that is exactly what I needed.

This book almost feels like reading two books in one. The first half is following Elsie as she interviews for a professor job at MIT where you see firsthand her passion for her work, her struggles as an adjunct and the politics within the field and academia.

The second half of the story is when we really see Elsie grow as a person with the help of Jack who truly sees her for the person she is and not a role she plays to make him like her. This really is a story about Elsie and how she begins to change a lifelong habit of changing herself to be what a person wants in order for them to like her and not leave her.

I found this to be relatable. Many of us do this to a point – hiding our true selves in the hopes of either blending in or just getting someone to like you.

I enjoyed this book and honestly, I liked the predictability of it all. I also like that she writes intelligent female characters. I gave this novel 4 stars.