Reviews with content warning for Gaslighting - La teoría del amor

Reviews tagging 'Gaslighting'

La teoría del amor by Ali Hazelwood

92 reviews

teardropsonmypaperback's review against another edition

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emotional funny hopeful lighthearted medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.75

Content Warnings

sami_leigh's review against another edition

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emotional funny hopeful informative inspiring lighthearted medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

🌟🌟🌟🌟🌟/5
🌶️🌶️🌶️/5

I’d give everyone the me they wanted, needed, craved, and in exchange they’d care about me.

And as much as I hate knowing that there’s someone out there whom I cannot win over, it also lets me off the hook, with Jack, I don’t need to be someone else, because I can’t be someone else. It’s unsettling, and disturbingly baring, and also . . . relaxing.

“When’s the last time you had someone in your life you could be completely honest with, Elsie?”

“And when I really let go, I imagine that you let me take care of you, too.”
“Why?”
“Because in my head, no one has done it before.”

“Can I take you out?”
“You mean you want to . . . murder me.”
“Once again, what happened to you?”

“You could be my entire world. If you let me.”
“I think I will.”

🥼 First person single POV (Elsie)
🥼 Enemies to lovers; experimental vs theoretical physicists
🥼 Forced proximity
🥼 He falls first
🥼 She is fake-dating his brother, he ruined her mentor’s career & her field’s credibility
🥼 She carefully curates versions of herself to please people, he sees right through her
🥼 Well established secondary characters; Cece, George, Greg, Olive & Adam!!!!!!!
🥼 Banter 🤣
🥼 Spice 😏
🥼 Consent culture 🙌🏻
🥼 Representation of toxic work environment academics can foster
🥼 Women in STEM 😍🙌🏻
🥼 Representation of Type 1 Diabetes
🥼 Representation of diverse sexualities via MC and SCs
🥼 MC growth; boundaries, recovering people-pleaser, family expectations, honesty/communication, past relationship trauma, family trauma (upbringing), self worth.
🥼 Epilogue
🥼 References to The Love Hypothesis & Love On The Brain; these stories exist in the same world 😍
🥼 Comfort read ✨

⚠️ Death of a parent (in past), toxic relationship (parents/family/others), sexism (mild in workplace), gaslighting (not MC to MC).

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kaetheluise_nckl's review against another edition

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emotional funny lighthearted relaxing sad medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

FMC has diabetes (type 1)
asexual male side character
WLW/sapphic relationship between side characters

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emmacartlidge's review against another edition

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emotional funny lighthearted medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

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katetravelsinbooks's review against another edition

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emotional medium-paced

Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated

3.0

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downtown_kb's review against another edition

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emotional funny lighthearted medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

Chronic people pleaser, physicist, and girlfriend for hire, Elsie finds things get a little complicated when her arch nemesis is the brother of her fake boyfriend and on the hiring board for her dream job.

I appreciate Ali Hazelwood’s sense of humor. I always forget. But I like her nerdy/quirky/slightly manic fmc’s. Elsie was no different but her self sabotage, antagonism towards Jack, and people pleasing really had me rolling my eyes at times.

Jack was sweet and hot. I liked his dirty mouth and how he teased her.

I really enjoyed the 3rd act drama here. I have never been so glad a couple in my romance book have a fight. It encompassed exactly what they both needed to face

Elsie got to see how sleazy her advisor was, which I pegged early on , and stand up for herself. Jack got to check his privilege. It was pretty messed up how long he let that all go on.

The plot was a little predictable and the academia stuff was a bit of a stretch/exaggerated but it made for an interesting conflict.

Her books are so low stakes binge worthy for me and this is no exception. And hey, I’m a fan of the size difference thing, and this was definitely her steamiest read to date.

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samisversion's review against another edition

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emotional reflective relaxing tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.75

Content Warnings

beckyyreadss's review against another edition

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adventurous challenging dark emotional funny medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

I wanted to read this book because I loved The Love Hypothesis – since then, every time Ali Hazelwood announces a new book, I instantly pre-order it and then just patiently wait.

This book follows Elsie Hannaway, she had many lives and personas. By day, she’s an adjunct professor, tolling away at grading labs and teaching thermodynamics in the hopes of one day landing tenure. At the weekend and evenings, 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. It is a sweet gig – until her carefully constructed Elsie-verse comes crashing down. Because Jack Smith, the annoyingly attractive and broody older brother of her favourite client, turns out to be the cold-hearted experimental physicist who ruined her mentor’s career and undermined the reputation of theorists everywhere. And that same Jack who now sits on the hiring committee at MIT, right between Elsie and her dream job. Elsie is prepared for an all-out war of scholarly sabotage, but at every step Jack is looking at her, it feels like he is looking into her soul and she doesn’t have to pretend around him. Will falling into an experimentalist’s orbit finally tempt her to put her most guarded theories on love into practice?

I loved these characters. Elsie is so awkward and so scared of falling in love and I relate to her a tad . . . okay, a lot. Her obsession with cheese and Twilight is something I can also relate to. I love how she stood up for against her family and that she isn’t the peacekeeper, she has a lot going on and if she wants to see the family it’s probably for a break rather than the deal with petty shit that her mother has asked her to deal with. This book deals with important conversations such as healthcare in America (which is shocking), sex workers (no Elsie isn’t one, but everyone assumes that a fake girlfriend means you are entitled to sex because you paid for her), women in STEM (which we stan.) I love most of the men within Ali Hazelwood’s universe, but Jack nearly overtook Adam, it was very close. He fell first, and he was pushing for her to be her true self and wanting her to grow. This man shows that my standards are six feet under. I loved the communication he had with her during the spicy chapters, but then the communication fell off during the actual interviews and book – if he had been honest with her and said the job was never yours with some seriousness rather than acting like it was for banter – 100 pages could have been cut from this book.

As much as I love these books, they are all getting a bit the same – the guys are all “towering” over the FMC, the FMC isn’t respected so the MMC demands respect in whichever power he holds (in this book, it was by backtracking his 15-year-old article) and they all seemed to like the same sex positions or the dynamic - I want some change please. I want a strong female who wants to take control in the bedroom, or a small man and a taller woman. It just seems to be the same of tall, dark and handsome and whilst I enjoy it, I would love to see Ali write something different with different people and different dynamics.

I enjoy this book and the banter and the dad jokes and the cameo of Adam and Olive, but I just wanted something different.

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midnightrose_reads's review against another edition

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emotional funny hopeful lighthearted sad medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

Love, Theoretically is the third romantic comedy in Ali Hazelwood’s STEMinist series. Elsie (a theoretical physicist) and Jack’s (a experimental physicist) romantic shenanigans were laugh out loud funny, and the character growth in each of the characters was heartwarming to read about. Ali is definitely one of my favorite rom-com writers!

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readwithria's review against another edition

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emotional funny lighthearted fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

Love, Theoretically is factually amazing. I blasted through this book and had so much fun with every second of it!

Elsie’s desire for connection at any cost is SO relatable, and her struggle to ask for what she wants resonates with me so hard. As an aspiring recovered people pleaser (not quite there yet) I have felt the exact things that she experienced throughout the book, and seeing that on the page was so reassuring.

The romance in this book 🥰 don’t even get me started. Jack might be my new favorite book boyfriend. Ali Hazelwood just knows that any man who packs snacks for his girlfriend has the key to my heart 😂

If you love any of Ali Hazelwood’s other books you should definitely give this one a read! 5 stars.

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