Love, Theoretically by Ali Hazelwood

💖💖💖💖/5

Love, Theoretically by Ali Hazelwood is an enemies to lovers story that is quirky and entertaining; complete with likable characters. Elsie is a physicist who works as an adjunct professor at three different colleges, which results in crazy commutes, an ever-lowering salary and infuriating (and hilarious) emails from students demanding deadline extensions. This is not the dream research job Elsie always wanted, and the lack of health insurance means she’s forced to pay for insulin out of pocket (she’s a Type I diabetic), and somehow still be able to afford rent and food everything else. Then she and her best friend start working for Faux, an app where people can basically request fake dates for different events such as parties, work functions, etc. Then Elsie finds herself in the running for a tenure-track professor position at MIT. Except, once she arrives at the first function she has to attend for the selection process, she’s shocked to find Jack, the brother of one of her fake boyfriends is there, and that Jack is actually Jonathan Turner-Smith, MIT professor and infamous legend in the physics field. Jack has misread Elsie from the beginning, thinking the worst of her.

 

Elsie has learned how to perfectly customize her personality so it’s optimal for anyone she’s interacting with: even with her family and closest friend; being that she is a definite people pleaser, wanting to be accepted. Only, there’s a fine line between wanting to be liked and staying true to yourself. Everyone has different facets of ourselves that come out or held back depending on the situation we’re in, but Elsie seems to be stuck in a loop of compromising her wants and thoughts to appease everyone else. Jack, also a physicist like Elsie, is the first person who comes into her life who seems to see through this act and call her out on it. Unfortunately this seemingly perfect guy is also responsible for causing chaos in Elsie’s career, making Jack her number one enemy; which is unfortunate because Jack is on the hiring committee for a job Elsie is determined to be hired for. 

 

Elsie is determined to prove herself to Jack in order to get her dream job; which is difficult since Jack thinks she’s hiding this secret life from his brother, and she can’t exactly contradict him without violating Greg’s privacy. Also, Jack needs to overcome his slight obsession with Elsie and actively try to hate her for catfishing his brother; despite the fact she’s not. This book really gets into the depth of scientific academia politics and you can’t help but fall into the rabbit hole along with the characters. I highly recommend Love, Theoretically to other readers.

 

I voluntarily reviewed a complimentary copy of this book.