Thank you so much to Net Galley and Berkley for an advanced copy of this book. I loved it!
Format: Net Galley Advanced Reader Copy
Genre: Contemporary Romance
Page Length: 384 pages
Publisher: Berkley Romance (September 14, 2021)
Star Rating: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
Mr. Darcy‘s Rating: “You must allow me to tell you how ardently I admire and love you.”
A Chasing Mr. Darcy Review
I'm always interested to read any book that puts romance into academic because, um, I'm an academic, and this book did not disappoint!
Here’s a plot synopsis from Amazon: 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.
This book just gave me all the feels. The main character, Olive, is a third year PhD candidate in this story, and it was so cathartic to read her journey on the page. I understand her journey of getting a PhD in a quantitative field (I have a PhD in finance), and I understand the specific struggles that come with being a female in a quantitative field. It's so hard to talk with anyone about this because so few people understand it. The book describes PhD school as a special kind of hell on earth, and it truly is. Ali Hazelwood got that struggle right in this story. Not to say the struggle isn't worth it, because it is. Some of my proudest moments in my life happened during graduate school when I mastered a task, excelled at a conference, etc...the success is certainly worth the struggle, but man is the struggle hard sometimes.
Olive constantly second guesses herself in the story, she constantly doubts herself, and she wonders if she'll ever be successful in her field...um hello, Ali Hazelwood, is this book about me because these sound like my exact days in PhD school, and THANK YOU for putting that on paper. One thing PhD school opens your eyes to is realizing how much there is you really don't know or understand...and then it's overwhelming to think about everything you still have left to learn. Olive goes through these stages in the story, and I cheered for her to triumph, and I cried when someone tried to make that triumph ugly. I am all too familiar with someone doing that in my field, and it hurt my heart when it happened to her. My favorite line from the book is when Olive's advisor tells her to do something "with all the confidence of a mediocre white man." That is pure gold right there.
To balance out Olive, the story had her fake boyfriend Adam, a full professor at her University. While I'm not sure realistically a situation like this would ever fly at a University (I know it would not have been smiled upon at my PhD granting institution), I did appreciate that the book took steps to make the reader understand the seriousness of a graduate student and professor dating. The story carefully clarifies that Adam cannot be in any situation in which he has any control or leverage over Olive...basically meaning he can't turn the relationship into a way to coerce sex from her in trade for professional favors. This distinction is important because it is never okay to romanticize teacher/student relationships, and by creating this distinction, Ali Hazelwood gives the reader the chance to just romanticize Adam and Olive for who they are together.
I really liked Adam. He actually reminded me a lot of my dissertation chair in his attitude and temperament. Adam gives out critical feedback, and sometimes this feedback isn't taken well by the students...and sometimes the students take this out on Olive when she's "dating" Adam. Adam takes his responsibility of molding minds seriously, and he truly wants them to succeed. This is exactly how my dissertation chair was and still is today. He's tough, he's critical, and he can be a bit moody...but he's the best, and he wants his students to be the best too.
I also really liked Adam and Olive together. There's a history there (no spoilers), and their chemistry is so good. It's not perfect, which is actually what I like about it because it makes it more real as they get to know each other. I teared up a bit when Adam told Olive he wished she could see herself like he saw her. Until you've really doubted your ability, you really don't understand the value of someone saying something like that to you. Adam was that person for Olive in the moment she needed it most. This book would have probably been a five star read for me EXCEPT that I didn't really like the sex scene between Adam and Olive. The story discusses how it's hard for Olive to feel attraction to people and act on that attraction (which I totally get), but the whole "you're too tight for even my finger to go in past the knuckle" and "will it even fit all the way in" was just too awkward for me. Spoiler, it DID fit all the way in; it just took some good ole fashioned foreplay...
Basically, this book gave me all the feels and brought back all the memories of PhD school. Sometimes I miss that constant learning environment, of having the cushion of my mentors around me everyday. Sometimes I even miss the pressure and the thrill of accomplishing something new, and that's a feeling you can only get when you're training IMO. Sure, I get a good feeling when I do something well as a professional academic, but it's just not the same. I'm so glad Ali Hazelwood wrote this story and gave me the chance to have these feelings again and to fall in love with these characters. I can already tell you I will be re-reading this one!
TW: sexual harrasment/assault
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