The Love Hypothesis – Book Review

When a fake relationship between scientists meets the irresistible force of attraction, it throws one woman’s carefully calculated theories on love into chaos.

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.

Last year, this book, The Love Hypothesis is the most talked and hyped books. I just wondered why there is so much hype about this book that I bought this book on Amazon.

OK, I know I am not really a romance novel fan though I have read good romance novels before. But honestly, I didn’t find much hype on this book (PS for those who have read and enjoyed this book–don’t hate me)

Olive Smith is a graduate student at Stanford University. By chance, in order to prove her friend that she can date, she kisses a man. That man was no other than Dr. Adam Carlsen who was one of the “well known” ass, who criticize his students’ works. Soon, the two embark on a fake dating scene.

Let’s start with the good things about this book

• I do like the whole science setting in this book–this reminded me of my undergraduate days as a biomedical student (a bit similar to Olive and Adam) and it was very rare I have read a book in such a setting–which made it more unique. The fact that Olive is in STEM program also made me reminice my days as a biomedical student.
• There were some funny parts in the story that will make you laugh out loud particularly the scenes between Olive and Adam and between Olive and her friends, Malcolm and Ahn.
• The writing was in my opinion good. The plot was OK.
• The fact about Olive’s mother dying from cancer and that she wanted to research about pancreatic cancer was touching and sensitive issue

Now before I begin the bad points, let’s be warned

Trigger warning:- sexual assault, death from cancer.

Now the bad points

• Overall as a story this was lame. I felt like I was watching an unrealistic cheesy rom com on the TV which I didn’t enjoy much.
• In my opinion, covering the sex scene in whole one chapter was cringe worthy. I mean, i skipped the whole chapter of the sex scene because I felt it was so explicit. That lowered my rating as a whole. Honestly, if the sex scene wasn’t there, this book would have been great.
• The fact that this was based on a fan fiction of Star Trek made my rating a little lower.
• The sunscreen situation, sitting on Adam’s lap during the conference…all seemed too unrealistic to me in my opinion.
• The only description of Adam was “tall”, “big” and “dark hair” and Olive was “skinny” and “short”. The personalities of both the main characters are bland in my opinion particularly Adam. I know Adam is supposed to be broody and all but his personality was not described properly in the book.
• Olive accidentally kissing the professor in the first part of the book–that scene was so unexpected and unrealistic.
• The story as a whole was predictable.

Nonetheless, I don’t mind reading Ali Hazelwood’s book but in my opinion, The Love Hypothesis is just an OK romance book. Maybe it was just me, but it was OK in my opinion. But for ones who love fake dating theme in books with unrealistic settings that is more like Hallmark movie, this book is one for you. Worth 3.5 stars!